The Black Phone (2022)

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Looking back, I remember being very interested in this movie. As advertised, I only really took it as a typical kidnapping-torture movie, which I generally don't go for. Still, the trailers carried the eerie atmosphere I enjoy in horror, which is always a green flag. Upon seeing it, I was so impressed that I considered it one of my favourite movies of the year, thanks to its creativity, the performances from everyone involved, and the fantastic job it did of advertising it as something far simpler than it was.

Fair trigger warning for this one, it does consist of such things as physical abuse towards a young girl and consistent bullying, so it may prove to be a little tricky to get through the first little bit. However, one could see this in comparison to a much lighter version of 'The Hills Have Eyes' or 'Last House on the Left' as far as style and execution - the worst parts make you want to see the hero kick some ass, and it delivers in its own, clever way with the performances of child actors Mason Thames and Madeleine McGraw; a couple of other young actors who convinced me would make a name for themselves and did, at least in Thames' case.

The story here takes place in 1978, where the streets of a Denver suburb are being terrorized by a child abductor who has been dubbed "The Grabber" (Ethan Hawke). In the meantime, we follow Finney (Thames) and Gwen Blake (McGraw), the children of an alcoholic, abusive father, Terrence (Jeremy Davies). To make his life worse, Finney is also constantly bullied at school, but he does have a friend, Robin (Miguel Cazarez Mora), who stands up to Finney's bullies for him, but is also the one who tries to push Finney into standing up for himself one day, which heavily foreshadows the nightmare to come. 

As for Gwen, she does okay in school, but gets heavily abused by her father, who blames her for things like the police calling their house, sadly not due to reports of abuse, but because Gwen seems to have some answers as far as the case of the Grabber goes, and here's where things get supernatural. Much like her late mother, she experiences psychic dreams in which she sees who the Grabber abducts next; an ability that allegedly drove her mother to commit suicide, which is the reason her Dad took to the bottle, and sees red any time these dreams are brought into question.

One such dream of Gwen's sends her into a panic, as it involves Finney, who is indeed taken, and awakens in a soundproofed basement, faced with his kidnapper, who goes back and forth to the room, not to harm him, but to keep an eye on him. Sitting on the wall of the room is a black rotary phone, which the Grabber insists doesn't work. Yet when the Grabber is out of the room, Finney gets constant calls from the former kidnapped kids who do what they can to help him escape. The catch, however, is that all of these kids are deceased. Working together, but apart, both Finney and Gwen use their abilities to stop the Grabber once and for all.

As far as giving the movie any honest criticism, I don't have much to offer. While bits and pieces may be predictable for some, the more unpredictable moments are well executed, namely the climactic scene, which I wouldn't call a twist but rather a bit of a surprise. For me, what I found perhaps most interesting about the film was that, for as solid a job Ethan Hawke does here as the villain, the true highlights of the movie, surprisingly, were the kids' performances. Opinions will differ as per usual, but considering their ages, their skills were compelling. 

I give the film credit for its share of imagination and creative ideas that put a unique spin on an otherwise fairly typical plot scenario. Between Gwen's creepy dreams and Finney's phone calls, it's a great movie to illustrate how some horror tropes (in this case the whole kidnapping and potential torture scenario) can still be really good if they provide a bit of the truly unusual, or even blend some aspects of horror with others, ie, dream/ghost horror with real world scenarios like the kidnapper. It's odd, but I welcome it with open arms because it's at least different and a little more unpredictable than your standard slasher or haunting flick.

4/5

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