976-EVIL (1989)

the audience applauded

Great Film overall

There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

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.

A typical late '80s horror film, which has an goodish premise (a direct phone line to Hell), but which loses things at the end. While the film could have been a lot more thoughtful and interesting, it wastes the story and instead gives us lots of special effects and gore, in place of plot development.However it's not quite as bad as some of the trash turned out in the 1980s, and the story is just about diverting enough to pass the time. Unfortunately, director Robert Englund, better known as Freddy Krueger in the NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET series (and for his incessant cameos in many 90's horror films) gives us a rather poor film, this man is an actor, not a director for god's sake, so why did he even bother? Most of the scenes are too dark and it's difficult to see what's going on. Englund's presence is even more obvious in the way that the demon makes stupid wisecracks and jokes at the end of the film, just like Freddy.The acting is pretty poor. Pat O'Bryan tries to be like Kevin Dillon in THE BLOB remake, but he's never convincing or sympathetic. He's just a clichéd rebel. There is a boring subplot involving a PI investigating the strange goings on, but this is frankly uninteresting. Sandy Dennis is quite good as the religious nutter of a mother (shades of CARRIE here) but is not given enough to do, while Robert Picardo (THE HOWLING, the Doctor from STAR TREK: VOYAGER) steals his single scene as a whacked-out loser who might just be the Devil in disguise. It's left to Stephen Geoffreys (FRIGHT NIGHT) to carry the main body of the film, and while he's quite funny as the nerdish, snivelling loser, he's not in the least bit effective at the end. I mean a tanktop, of all things, doesn't really cut it does it? There are quite a lot of special effect scenes, with people burning and getting ripped open, although there appears to be absolutely no police presence in the city where the film is set. While the gore is not excessive there are lots of people dying in bloody ways, and one girl nearly goes the spider death routine from THE BEYOND, only for the scene to change track halfway through. The demon makeup at the end of the film is surprisingly understated and therefore more realistic, and as the scenes are set in the dark this makes it more believable too.If you can get over this film's flaws and accept the fact that it's no different from a million others, then you might enjoy it in fits and starts. Or if you're a strange fan of cheesy, poor '80s horror films then you'd probably like it as well. The fact is, though, that the theme of revenge is old (the ultra low-budget MASSACRE AT CENTRAL HIGH did it a decade before, and better), and the theme of selling one's soul to the devil is even older, i.e. with Faust. Critical watchers would be well advised to watch something else, as there is a lot of stuff in here (90% of it in fact) which wouldn't stand up to those with a low tolerance threshold.

When the 1988 horror film "976-EVIL" was first released in December of that year, its promotional poster bore the legend "Revenge Is On The Line." However, I believe the picture might have improved on its $3 million U.S. gross at the box office if, instead, that poster had rightfully proclaimed "The Film So Shocking, It Could Only Have Been Directed By Freddy Krueger!" And indeed, 1988 WAS a big year for Freddy portrayer Robert Englund. Besides appearing as Krueger for the fourth time, in "A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master" (and Englund would go on to portray his most famous screen persona four more times afterward!), the beloved actor, after dozens of film and TV appearances, directed his first film. And, as it turns out, "976-EVIL" does have much in common with the lesser Freddy films: It features some nice-looking FX, violent set pieces and a barely comprehensible story line, all tied together by some corny but undeniably amusing one-liners.In the film, the viewer makes the acquaintance of two very different first cousins. The older, Spike (Patrick O'Bryan), is a prototypically cool and handsome dude who cruises around town on a Harley and has no problem at all scoring with the babes. Spike is idolized by his younger cousin, Hoax (Stephen Geoffreys), who is the prototypical...how shall I put it? Nerd? Dweeb? Putz? Schlemiel? The two live together with Hoax' mom, Lucy (two-time Tony winner/Oscar winner Sandy Dennis), a crackpot Bible-thumper and all-around harridan, and their young lives are soon thrown into turmoil when Spike finds a card with the titular phone number emblazoned on it. Once dialed, this number gives callers their so-called "horrorscope," which is unfailingly apropos to their life situation at the moment, be it money problems, girl problems, etc. Spike has no use for this gimmick, which he deems "bullsh_t," but poor Hoax rapidly gets sucked in, and before long, has been vested--long distance, as it were--with supernatural powers and the hands and visage of a hellish demon. (Hoax kinda sorta looks like the Michael Jackson zombie in that "Thriller" video, toward the film's end, more than anything else!) All the better, to finally take vengeance on all the high school bullies who have long been harassing him. Unfortunately for Hoax, however, his "telephone bill" soon comes due....I should perhaps mention here that my only reason for renting out "976-EVIL" in the first place was because it does feature Sandy Dennis--who I have been enamored with since the mid-'60s--here in her penultimate role. Sadly, the role is one that's hardly fitting for this wonderful actress, and the result is practically an on-screen embarrassment. Decked out in a fright wig and housecoat, Sandy looks fairly ghastly here, and her performance is a mannered, wildly over the top, caricatured mess. She almost seems to be channeling Piper Laurie's performance as the crazy evangelist mother from hell in 1976's "Carrie," but to much less effect. Indeed, I have to wonder WHY Sandy decided to participate in this film at all, and can only conclude that she wanted to either (a) do another horror film, following 1977's truly freaky "God Told Me To," or (b) play a character who is just as much a lover of cats as she was. (Dennis purportedly had dozens and dozens of cats living with her in her Westport, CT home.) Whatever the reason, "976-EVIL" is assuredly the worst film I have ever seen Dennis in, and it marks the only time that she has portrayed a thoroughly unlikable character. What a disappointment for me!I mentioned "Carrie" a moment ago, and it strikes me that the Dennis character is not the only point of similarity between the two films. Both feature a teenager who is very much an outsider, who lives with a religious wackadoodle of a mom, who is in possession of extraordinary powers, and who uses those powers to wreak violent vengeance on his/her high school oppressors. But whereas "Carrie" is a class act, with many now-iconic images, "976-EVIL" just barely makes the grade. Its story line is both confused and confusing (says Michael J. Weldon in one of MY Bibles, "The Psychotronic Video Guide": "too confusing"), with sketchy characters, a sketchy plot and the sketchiest of explanations at the tail end. Still, it remains a passable entertainment, thanks to those violent set pieces (the film dishes out several electrocutions, explosions, poisonous spiders, a face slashing, eviscerations, a dismemberment and other nasty tidbits) and some memorable one-liners. In perhaps the funniest scene, the demon Hoax walks into a poker game being played by his bullying enemies. In his hands rest the bloody cardiac muscles that he has just ripped from two of their chests. His line: "Would it be possible to enter the game with a pair of hearts?" Funny stuff, and a line that ol' Freddy himself might have leered at with approbation. And speaking of Freddy, I must add here that Englund's direction is surprisingly capable and fine; he is not the problem here. Rather, screenwriters Rhet Topham and Brian Helgeland are the ones to blame, I feel, for their poorly developed plot and unfleshed-out characters. Without a solid script and story, a film has nothing, and I have a hunch that by this picture's conclusion, many "976-EVIL" viewers will be muttering a line that Barbara Stanwyck kept hearing in a famous 1948 film noir: "Sorry, wrong number...."

Yes, it is a cheesier knock-off of Carrie: Here we have our tormented, misfit teen (Stephen Geoffreys instead of Sissy Spacek this time)who gains supernatural abilities (demonic possession instead of telekinesis this time) and proceeds to take nasty revenge on the bullies who done him dirty and on his psycho-Christian of a mother (told ya, Carrie) played by Sandy Dennis, who, if humanly possible, does a more over-the-top variation of Piper Laurie's performance.But Mr. Geoffreys makes this a gem of 80's horror. His performance is so quirky and, at times, so endearing, and yet he can be frickin'SCARY when he wants to - check him out in the scene where he attacks a gang of bullies in the projection room of a movie theater. It's a thrill to watch because of him. Also the bathroom stalking. And, well, every scene once be becomes fully possessed. I'm glad to hear about his return to the genre after the (in my opinion) unfortunate turn his life took not long after he made Fright Night and this. Welcome back, Mr. Geoffreys! All in all, worth watching for horror - and, more specifically, 80's horror - aficionados.Cheers.