So I saw The Black Phone and it was not as bad as I thought it would be:
the trailer made it seem like it's something that would really annoy me and it did, just not as much as I thought...
The film has an absolutely horrendous first 15 minutes, a thoroughly hilarious last five minutes and everything in between is pretty good.
A gigantic contributor to the horrendous and hilarious aspects of this film would be the terrible dialogue:
most of the actors in this film are child actors and this is one of very many films where the writer can't seem to write dialogue for child characters.
[Clip] -I've seen Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Friday night, you've seen it
-That movie's rated R, my dad would never take me to see that.
-My uncle takes me to the drive-in we see everything.
-Oh man, that movie: it's the best.
[YMS] -There's some scenes where it's very clearly just the writer talking,
and the child actors just aren't competent enough to pull off the material that they're given.
Even dialogue given to the adult actors seems very transparent and forced.
The way that they handle Exposition in this film makes it seem like the script is talking rather than the characters:
the father character will say things like "Listen you are my daughter and you are having dreams and they are not real,
"and your mother (who's not here anymore) also had those dreams and she's crazy and they're not real and they're not premonitions." Uh that... that's at the plot that's happening right now....
There's characters shown throughout the beginning of the film and the script makes it pretty clear which ones are going to be relevant again later:
because the script has these characters just constantly saying and repeating their names,
nobody talks like that and it is distractingly unsubtle...
Here's an actual conversation from the film...
[Clip] -What the hell? That was Moose!
-I don't care...
-Moose is a giant asshole!
-I know!
-But last year when he made your nose bleed, he had it coming...
-Oh where's that coming?
-Penny he beats you -I know, Bren, I was there, remember?
Just don't want to talk about it
-Well he was super difficult to fight with, Robin Ariana, he's the toughest kid in school since the Grabber got Pinball Vance Hopper.
I wish you wouldn't call him that...
-Everyone called him Pinball Vance.
[YMS] -Nobody talks like that! It's a very unsubtle film and because of this, it often feels like it doesn't respect its audience...
Even ignoring the dialogue, there are other aspects of this film that I wish were done with a bit more subtlety:
at the very end of this same scene the shot ends with the black van in the background...
Wouldn't that have been so much more effective as something you're likely to notice, rather than something that's impossible not to notice?
The engine sound they added over top was also particularly loud in a theater.
So yeah, I guess more of a personal preference compared to the dialogue, but still, it felt like there was a missed opportunity there.
As the film goes on, the performances get remarkably better and this is mostly because the actors are given dialogue that allows them to perform.
Everyone's acting becomes a lot better when they're given dialogue that isn't just childish clunky exposition dumps.
For child actors the main two characters are actually pretty good: even if there's giant chunks of the film where the dialogue holds them back.
Eventually we get to the main chunk of the film that was shown in the trailers,
the main character is trapped in a room because he got kidnapped by the Grabber.
The Grabber is a guy that wears a mask and he is played by Ethan Hawke and in the room is a black phone and the kid gets spooky messages...
*sarcastic* Ring ring I'm a ghost, oh no...
I enjoyed the design of this room it seems to have taken some inspiration from the Silent Hill games
and for the most part this main chunk of the film Works decently well: the dialogue is not as terribly written, the atmosphere is effective,
I like what's happening conceptually,
basically all of the previous kids that the Grabber murdered, are calling the main character on the phone and they all have memory problems because they're ghosts or something...
But they give him little hints on how to escape, maybe...
So it's a fun little mystery escape room kind of thing, it's compelling enough to keep me interested and there weren't as many egregiously annoying parts.
The music in this film also was not terrible and there was even a licensed Pink Floyd song that really helped with the energy near the end of the film.
So yeah that's all the non-spoiler stuff I have to say, so let's get to spoiler talk!
Another unsubtle aspect of this film is them showing the dead ghost kids...
When he first picks up the phone and it's just a voice, it's so creepy, I loved it, but then they just started showing the kids...
There was no more mystery no imagination it just wasn't scary anymore.
Less is often more, especially for horror films, the dialogue and acting and audio filters of the dead kids on the phone it all worked together pretty well.
The visual just really felt like Overkill, speaking of which, this film decided there would be no opening death
and don't get me wrong, I love it when films break away from formulas, but there's an important reason why these exist in horror movies:
by showing a character's death before the the main character is confronted by the villain, you are setting expectations for the audience as to what the villain is capable of.
You are also setting expectations for what the film is willing to show,
So when you don't show anything, then what am I supposed to expect?
*sarcastically* Oh what a coincidence that this is the one time that a blumhouse movie didn't have an opening death
and all of the characters just happen to be children, it's just a coincidence, yeah... 😒
Is this horror movie for children? This film is rated R but showing child deaths would just be too upsetting for people I guess...
No opening death for this movie in particular...
even though we're telling you these characters have died, we apparently do not want you to believe that we would show something like that in a film
and also you're supposed to believe the main character is in danger... Okay...
This film showed so much unnecessarily and then forgot to show the basics
and it's not like you're forced to be unsubtle if you do show something:
a good example of this is about halfway through the film when they finally start giving us ideas of what the main character is facing.
The main character notices the door is left open and one of the kids on the phone calls him and is like
"No it's a trap, he will- he's waiting up there and he will beat you so many times, with the belt, that you'll be begging him to stop and you'll be screaming and crying and he'll just keep beating you."
This is a great example of letting viewers use their imagination: you are providing a thorough description of what the villain is capable of,
it paints images in the viewers minds and yeah I wish that they kept the kid as just a voice over the phone,
because it would be a lot less lame and cheesy, but at least they managed to give us some idea of the potential threats facing the main character.
Which if I remember correctly we did not have any of up until this point.
they spent a good amount of time talking about the little girl's psychic powers and then nothing came of it...
You could remove her character from the entire movie and nothing would be different:
she led the police to the wrong house and the kid got out anyway
and when the script does all of its reveals they are very dumb; so the Grabber had two properties across the street from each other,
one for trapping the alive kids and one for burying the dead kids and the one where he's keeping and beating and torturing the alive kids, is the house his brother lives in upstairs,
but is completely oblivious to all of this, earlier in the film he says that he sound proofed the basement so that he would never find out.
But doesn't that directly contradict how he leaves the door open as a trap and then waits for the kids at the top of the stairs with a belt to beat them while they scream a bunch?
You'd think his brother would hear that since that's not in the basement, the ghost said he did that to all of the kids so apparently soundproofing the basement didn't really mean anything...
It shows him waiting there all night, on several nights and as is shown in the film this is when his brother is home...
The one time the main character gets past the lock the dog on the other side of the door goes crazy and when the Grabber brings him back we hear his brother...
[Clip] -Hey what was all that noise I heard?
-Sampson was barking at something, it's nothing, go back to bad, Max...
Why isn't he using the house that his brother is in as the bury the dead kid's house instead?!
He wouldn't have to worry about these sounds, if he just used the other house across the street, to keep the alive kids in...
What was the point of soundproofing the basement, if you're gonna wait at the top of the stairs, outside of the basement, to start beating the kids??
It's very silly and it was clearly only written this way, just so they could have some misdirection at the end; like, "Whoa the cops are showing up,
"I bet they're about to save him. Wait they're in the wrong house! Whoa! I didn't realize that, oh!"
And when the cops do show up, we get the funniest line in the entire film: they show up at the house and look through the main floor before saying,
"It's empty we got the wrong house let's go I guess we don't have anything to do here...
[Clip] -Wait!
"We've got a basement!"
[YMS] -Like they were actually gonna leave without even knowing that there was another floor to the house...
Was this film set in Uvalde Texas? What a great line...
By the end of the film The main character is able to kill the villain and it was pretty satisfying watching him suffer.
Although it's kind of funny that this kid was able to destroy like, everything in the room, without him noticing...
Over the course of the film, he takes the grate off the window and like, digs holes and shit and Ethan Hawke never notices, it's crazy...
Which is really weird because, earlier in the film when the kid shows up there, Ethan Hawke is just waiting by his bedside, watching him...
But then that never happens again, he just stays out of the room and the kid's able to do all this escape room stuff...
Anyway, this movie was fine for what it was: there are elements that I appreciated even if there was a lot of nonsense,
When I finished watching it, I thought: it's pretty great for someone's first film.
And then I realized that this wasn't someone's first film and this was directed by Scott Derrickson, who has made six other movies...
So yeah, I understand why people like this; it is not incompetent throughout, it's good... for a horror movie, I guess...?
It didn't leave a terrible taste in my mouth, but yeah I have no reason to see this one again...
It was fine, I'm done talking about it now...
and I'm giving this one a 5 out of 10.
Thank you.
Another film I saw was Crimes of the Future, the new David Cronenberg film and I have a lot less to say about this because nothing happened...
It was not an offensively bad film, it was just very empty...
It was ultimately pointless and it took a long time to say very little.
The story exists within a Weird Science Fiction future type world,
but the scope and scale of this film is so incredibly limited, that it never really feels like we're a part of the world.
I can see some of the ideas that the film has for the world, but it doesn't feel like we're in it...
Both plot wise and Visually it was pretty stale and repetitive: it felt like the film only had a few sets.
Pretty much every shot only ever had a few characters in frame; again this film isn't offensively bad or anything, all of the basic filmmaking elements were just fine...?
But it didn't really build to anything, it really felt like the film was missing an entire third act...
So yeah, a very pointless and forgettable. I barely remember this movie it was like I watched nothing...
And I'm giving this one a 5 out of 10, thank you.
[Adum] -No, go in the same spot! What are you doing?! This is my side!
Get the fuck away from me! I'm gonna go over h-
DON'T FOLLOW ME!!
We're trying to be on a team!
Go to different places!
Oh my Gahd!
Go to different places!
[Friend] -Here I come, daddy!
Ahhhhggghhhh!
[Adum] -YOU PEOPLE SUCK!
YOU PEOPLE SUCK SO MUCH!
[Other Friend] *Hysterical laughing*