976-EVIL

source: 976-EVIL

Oh!...I am in awe of how terrible this movie is. I am a huge horror movie fanatic. And i finally got a chance to see this. It is one of the worst i have ever seen, next to "Troll 2" (that might even be better). I could barely make it through. The directing was awful, the storyline is SO awful, characters are 2d, special effects are worthless. It was so bad, i wanted to laugh and cry at the same time. The story is about a Nerdy boy who lives with his Christian "mommy", who gets picked on at school by bullies in the bathroom. They spend a lot of time in that bathroom it seems. The cousin of this infamous nerd is a bad ass motor cycle riding 80's boy toy who's reckless with the "babes". They all seem to tamper with this phone-line 976-evil, that tempts them into doing naughty things, via "satan". After some time, the main character (nerd), gets obsessed and the evil takes him over. Wow. Then the tension builds!...He goes on a minor rampage taking foes out. I wouldn't want to spoil the terrific ending in case your tempted to see this (note the sarcasm). If i could rate this below a 1, i would. It is a waste of anyone's time. You will actually kill brain cells by watching it.

Not the best horror film that you will watch, but it is significant as Robert Englund's director debut. It's a typical story of a nerdy teen (Stephen Geoffreys) with a whacked out mother (Oscar-winner Sandy Dennis looking a lot heavier than I remember her), who keeps getting his head shoved in the toilet by the school bullies, and just wants to be cool like his cousin Spike (Patrick O'Bryan). He manages to find a way to reach out to the dark side and get revenge on everyone - well, almost everyone. His goofs in his first attempt to scare his cousin's girl (former Cowboy's cheerleader Lezlie Deane) and kills her. If you have a thing about spiders, you may want to fast forward through this part. He perfects his craft as he changes into a satanic beast. The makeup and special effects were really good. The only problem I had was the length of time that it took to get here. The movie was pretty boring up to this point. Maybe Englund will do better as he directs himself later this year. Of course, there is a sequel where Spike returns to battle the evil.

Robert Englund finally steps behind the camera, directing "976-EVIL", about a phone number that gives people satanic powers. As you may expect, it's not any kind of great movie; but don't worry, it doesn't pretend to be. This movie is all about nice, fun entertainment, and it gives us just that (plus at least one hot scene). In the lead role is Stephen Geoffreys, whom you may recognize as Evil Edward from "Fright Night"; he sure gets some evil roles. Also starring are Sandy Dennis as the fundamentalist Christian aunt (by "fundamentalist Christian", I mean that watching the movie, she's so obnoxious that you just hope that something nasty happens to her) and Robert Picardo (who frequently appears in Joe Dante's movies). A pretty neat movie.

976-EVIL (1988) * 1/2 (out of 4) Hoax (Stephen Geoffreys) is a teen who is constantly being picked on. His older, cooler cousin Spike (Patrick O'Bryan) has gotten involved with a phone number, which is actually a connection to Satantic forces. After being picked on one time too many, Hoax calls the number and soon seeks revenge on those who have tormented him. 976-EVIL is best remembered for being directed by Robert Englund but I must say that I really didn't find too much of it to be impressive. There have been all sorts of horror films based around teens being picked on and of course there's the "fun" of seeing them get their revenge. Sadly, there's really nothing fun about this movie and in fact I was pretty shocked at how boring it actually was. The biggest issue with this film is that you have to be patient with it. I was quite patient with it as not much happened for the first twenty-minutes. Then thirty-minutes. And then forty-minutes. Then fifty-minutes. Nothing really happened for more than 50% of the running time and we all eventually run out of patience. I was really shocked because there's not really anything that happens in the movie and once things finally start to pick up its too late as you've already checked out. The direction by Englund has a few clever touches including one sequence in a bathroom that has the camera above the toilets looking down. The performances are actually good with Geoffreys turning in fine work with a somewhat forgettable character. Sandy Dennis steals the film in a more comic bit as Hoax's crazy mother who is a bigger religious nut than Carrie White's mother! 976-EVIL is a pretty boring film that really doesn't have too much going for it. Even the death scenes are rather lame and as far as 80's horror films go, this one here is pretty forgettable.

In "976-EVIL," Satan's on the line and if you value your soul, you better not pick up. Or so it goes in this lame-brained horror flick directed by Mr. Freddy Krueger himself, Robert Englund, which includes a script written by Brian Helgeland and Rhet Topham. With Englund's first time behind the camera, you would expect something truly unique or at least something close to being even remotely frightening like "A Nightmare on Elm Street" (1984), but when things get interesting "976-EVIL" devolves into typical slasher/possession stuff and thus joins the ranks of so many other "B" horror movies from the 1980s. The movie at least has an inventive premise: dialing the title phone number puts you on a hot line with the Devil himself. A creepy voice (Englund) on the other end gives you some advice (your "horror-scope") and it pays off, but usually at a price: your soul. Teenage biker-punk Spike (Patrick O'Neal), an indebted gambler, is able to use the words of wisdom bestowed upon him and break free of his poker habit before the hot line's influence has a chance to truly take hold of him. His cousin, shy and repressed Hoax ("Evil Ed" Stephen Geoffreys), isn't so lucky. Bullied and unlucky with the ladies, he dials 976-EVIL and before you know it, the otherwise good boy with good morals goes from fundamentalist Christian to practicing Satanist in the time it takes for you to dial that evil number. Now a full-fledged psychopath possessed by the Devil, he soon starts growing jet-black fingernails and scales and speaking in an ever-creepy Satanic voice who has a tendency of dropping painfully unfunny one-liners that mostly fall flat on their face. Of course with a title like "976-EVIL," you could only expect the worst from this horror movie. The film starts off good, with one unlucky caller meeting their demise, and then the main characters are introduced but once the scares start coming, it all falls apart. But even then, it takes almost forever for that to even start. Geoffreys, a regular in '80s horror movies like 1985's "Fright Night," seems almost pitch-perfect as the shy kid who stood to gain some confidence with Satanic powers, but comes off instead as another rejected nerd-turned-braindead screen slasher who goes on a murderous rampage against his tormentors. There is one particularly creepy sequence where he's able to manifest a spider TV dinner upon one unfortunate victim. We should have expected better from Mr. Englund and as expected, we got less. And Joe Dante regular Robert Picardo also appears as Mark Dark, the manager of a sleazy phone-sex operation. "976-EVIL" - Hang up, fast! 3/10

976-EVIL (1989) was a bad movie that came out during the 80's horror movie explosion. This was also Robert Englund's attempt at making a movie. He took a topical theme and try to add a horror spin to it. But all you got was a badly directed and acted film with a creepy villain trying to be a second rate Freddy Krueger (i.e. spouting off very bad one liners). A no good rascal (Spike) who lives with a strange woman and her nerdy kid is extremely bored. Besides spending his time riding around like a rebel without a clue an keeping the kid (Hoax) from being eaten alive at school,. Spike has nothing to look forward to in life. One day he comes across and ad for a 976 number. The phone number promises it could "help" him with his problems and what not. He tries it but is spooked by the voice at the other end. But someone close to him has a use for the number. Who can that be? Overall a very bad movie. Maybe if they had a better scriptwriter and director, if might have succeeded. Sadly it fails as a horror film and as a black comedy. Although the first film was bad, the sequel was actually entertaining. My advice to you is to avoid part one and skip ahead to the sequel. Strongly avoid, unless you really dig bad movies and film-making. Bad stuff indeed.

The scant few teenagers who went to see "976-EVIL" in 1989 probably had no idea who Sandy Dennis was (just as the kids who first saw "Carrie" didn't know who Piper Laurie was), but the veteran actress manages to bring a few minutes of class to an otherwise lousy, fifth-rate screamer about a nerdy high school kid acquiring demonic powers from a satanic phone number. Amateurish mishmash, derivative and grimy, marked the directorial debut of Freddy Krueger himself, Robert Englund. Englund offers precious little originality, but he does let Dennis strut her stuff in an amusing, fanatical supporting bit heavily reminiscent of Piper Laurie's religious mama from "Carrie". * from ****

Ah, the late eighties, when every time you turned around, someone was releasing a new supernatural slasher flick on a no-longer-very-unsuspecting audience. If only they could all have been at least as good as 976-EVIL, how much happier those times would have been. The plot is far and away better than I've come to expect, with several good twists, and characters capable of surprising decisions and shifting between sympathetic and unsympathetic roles. The set design and cinematography are amazing, with a unique retro-punk, exaggerated style and many visual echos and interconnections to the movie's themes. For instance, check out the local businesses - Dante's Diner (I'd like to suggest the motto, "Home of the Zombie Waitress!"), the El Diablo Theater with its non-stop horror marathon, and Virgil's garage. The costumes are amazing, from the Happy-Days-meets-Clockwork-Orange look of the various punks and low-lives, to Aunt Lucy's proper Christian outfits and astounding wigs. All in all, 976 turned out to be much more than I bargained for. A pleasant surprise.

Eighties horror tends to vary; it can be either trashy and great or trashy and trash, and unfortunately this film belongs more in the latter category. But that's not to say it's all bad! Freddy Krueger himself, Robert Englund directs a film about an outsider getting their revenge, in the style of films like Carrie and Evilspeak. The plot isn't very original, as we've got a rather common 'evil down the phone' theme, and it also features some kid getting possessed. In fact, it's not even a world away from A Nightmare on Elm Street, in which Englund made his name; but unfortunately, even some of the sequels to Craven's commercial hit are better than this film. The plot follows some kid who finds an advert for a 'horrorscope'. Naturally, he can't resist phoning it up, and neither can his younger cousin (it would have gone straight in the bin if I'd found it). Unfortunately, it turns out that whoever rings this number gets possessed by the devil and begins getting his revenge on all those who have wronged him. As you've probably guessed; brains aren't a major strongpoint here. The relationship between the two cousins that the film centres on makes up its backbone, and it could have been good if Englund had spent a bit more time concentrating on it. Unsurprisingly, the kill scenes and gore seem to be Englund's main priority, and while I don't necessarily have a problem with this; the final third is pretty much entirely about the younger cousin's 'revenge', and it doesn't take long to get really boring. Before that, however, the film seems to be mimicking the USA's other popular genre in the eighties; teen comedy, and it's actually quite funny with it. It becomes rather annoying at the end when just about everything you've seen leading up to it amounts to nothing, though. The acting isn't too bad, with future gay * star Stephen Geoffreys taking the lead role and convincing as a young kid despite actually being in his mid-twenties during filming. Patrick O'Bryan is his opposite number, and while it's not exactly a mystery as to why he hasn't made many films since, he puts in a decent performance overall. On the whole, this isn't a horror classic; and it's not really all that good either, but if you're into eighties horror; there's something here.