976-EVIL

Stephen Geoffreys is the type of actor that Bob Saget and Eminem wish they could be! Stephen takes a bland horror flick and transforms it into a surreal epic! Stephen is Hoax, a shut-in of a teenager who lives with his insane and controlling mother. Stephen rules, dude! He is one of the best actors that I can think of, and his performance in this film will make you, as the viewer, feel quite a variety of emotions all at once! Good stuff, man!

Some moments work better than others and the film takes a trip to bizarro world towards the end and you stop caring, but for Robert Englund's directorial debut, 976-Evil has more style than expected and at least two great performances from Stephen Geoffreys and Sandy Dennis. Geoffreys is great as the put upon high school dork who gains his confidence due to demonic possession and Dennis swings from the rafters as his campy religious freak mother. Also worth seeing for some great effects even if it seems like this movie got the MPAA on a bad day. Even the so-called uncensored version feels like it was cut to ribbons.

Well I personally found the film about average. The story centres around cousins Spike (Patrick O'Bryan) and Hoax (Stephen Geoffreys). Also in the picture is Hoax's religious nut mother Lucy (Sandy Dennis), who wins my award for the most annoying character I've ever seen in a movie, and that's not a good thing.

At the start of the movie Spike loses a game of poker to a gang and as a result must give up his motorcycle. Not really seeming too bothered by it all he phones up a number, 976-EVIL, which puts him through to some cheesy sounding "horrorscope" service. Paying some attention to what he hears Spike finds a way of getting the money for the gang so he isn't required to give up his bike. Hoax, who is basically a nerd, the subject of constant bullying also in turn phones the number and starts to hear the twisted horrorscope's advice...

The film itself is ok. Nothing special at all, but fun in it's own little way. O'Bryan and Geoffrey's performances were quite good, unlike the majority of the cast. 976-Evil is badly made in my opinion. The acting is bad and the direction is lacklustre...but lets give Rob some credit, at least the film wasn't too bad. The major problems with the film lie in the screenplay, acting in horror can be forgiven occasionally, and sometimes shaky direction can actually be of benefit to horror, but the screenplay needed to be solid and it wasn't.

The plot evolves far too quickly in some places and not near fast enough in others. After a particular incident in the film involving fish falling from the sky Jim Metzler is introduced as Marty, a journalist for a religious magazine, or at least I think he was, at one point he did pass himself off as a private investigator! Considering the rather small amount of information Marty was given throughout the film he certainly seems to trace the problems to the '976-EVIL' number rather quickly, this to me was a major plot fall.

Also some characters in the film just seemed to appear, while others disappeared for a while then came back with no explanation for their absence or why they've chosen to suddenly show up. The whole story seems very inconsistent on the speed at which it moves. To watch this film and fully enjoy it I think you need to keep concentrating which unfortunately in a film like this can be quite difficult to do now and again, but I think that's the only way for the whole film to make sense.

All in all a quite enjoyable, yet unsatisfying horror film, don't expect too much gore though there were some quite cool special effects and make-up and don't expect a masterpiece. Also, as the story is rather weak don't expect too much from that either, otherwise you will be disappointed. It's the type of horror film I'd probably watch again on sleepless nights.

I guess I have a soft spot, a very small one, for this forgotten film, which was directed by horror icon Robert Englund. I think it's because it came out at the end of the 80's, which is the decade I saw the majority of my horror films, as I consider myself a horror buff. I've seen it listed as either 1988 or 1989, but I don't think I've seen many more horror films since then, as the 80's wrapped up my teen years. An interesting tidbit has star Stephen Geoffreys basically become a gay porn star not long after this film came out, no pun intended. You probably won't recognize anyone else, other than perhaps Sandy Dennis, and maybe Robert Picardo. I thought the premise of the film was fairly original; you call a "horrorscope" number, and you get to speak to the Devil. There's a catch though, if you don't do what "he" says, you get a strange sounding ring on a nearby pay phone(remember them?)and bad stuff may happen to you. Buyer beware! I'll get the bad out of the way; first off, I didn't like how Hoax decided to play a cruel, but deadly joke on Suzie, considering she was very nice to him, and even tried to protect him from bullies. Her death scene was pretty lame, as far as horror standards go. Also, the way the house turned into a foamy ice inside, and the fire effects under the house, were cheesy at best. I did like the creature's make-up for the most part, although the extra large hands and feet could've been done better. I also thought the fish falling from the sky was interesting, and I haven't seen anything like it before or after this film. Mark Dark was a very cool addition, but I wish there was more background on his character. To finish this review, I'll reiterate that this has some late 80's charm to me, and was probably one of the last horror films I saw, at least from what I can recall, as the 80's gave me some really cool horror film memories, and I'll proudly include this film as well.

Receiving a strange calling card, a teen living with his cousin realize that a growing obsession with the horoscope line after it's predictions come true realize he's gained Satanic powers through the line and when a spate of violent murders occurs they ban together to stop him.

For the most part, this here wasn't all that bad. One of the main elements to this one is the fact that this is one of the cheesiest films of it's time, as most of this is taken up by the general tone of the plot. The very idea of it's central premise, being invested of Satanic powers through a horoscope hot-line is pretty goofy, and yet there are certain scenes here that play off that goofiness with gusto here as the action of that occurring is where this one really gets enjoyable. The opening stalking scene of the victim being blown up and set on fire in a phone booth, having the spiders in the oven- dinner, the bathroom stalking when he's possessed taking out the gang- members who bullied him and the second poker game held during the rampage are perfect examples of the cheesiness throughout here, as they should not be taken seriously and yet come across as perfectly serious during it's time. As well, the film's at its best at the last half hour, which is where all the fun really starts to happen since the body count picks up and we get the highlight with the trip through the frozen house is ably chilling as it contains a few nice suspense sequences and features a really nice jump at the end in addition to the big final confrontation that works rather nicely. Alongside the fine gore for the kills and the great cheese here, these are the film's positive points as there wasn't a whole lot against this one. One of the biggest detriments, which is also it's greatest asset, is the high amount of cheese on display. While it makes the film a lot of fun, the fact is that it makes it appealing only to those who enjoy that in their films. For those who want it more serious, the cheese here will make it a lot harder to get into. The central premise is a little hard to swallow, the joke- filled nature of it drags it down slightly, and the biggest drawback is the tone given to the film. There's a bluish hue surrounding most of the film that gives it a low-budget feel and really does make it a little tougher to sit through. The other big problem against it is a slow beginning. This is a necessity to build it up, but to make the first forty minutes of it so uneventful beyond setting up angles to play off later is a problem to overcome. Though not as prominent as the cheese factor, it still hurts it to a degree. Likewise, the rather confusing narrative doesn't help this by seemingly introducing characters here for no real reason and letting them survive as they do is a little surprising, which doesn't really do the film many favors either, and all told these here are the film's biggest issues.

Rated R: Graphic Violence, Graphic Language, Nudity, a brief sex scene and drug use.