The Black Phone | For Ethan Hawke’s performance ★★★

Kidnapped by a sadistic killer and locked in a soundproof basement, a 13-year-old boy can rely on a disconnected phone as his only salvation, which puts him in touch with the killer’s previous victims.

Doctor Strange was a bit of a misstep for filmmaker Scott Derrickson. After abandoning his suite for “creative differences”, here he is returning to his favorite genre: horror. The Black Phone (The black phone in French version) could moreover be related to a spiritual cousin of its own Sinister (2012), where a writer played by Ethan Hawke sought to explain mysterious disappearances of children.

The star crosses the mirror this time and he is the cause of all these kidnappings. In the shoes of a scary masked man nicknamed The Grabber, the actor personifies one of the most memorable villains of recent years. A disturbing and elusive being, a sort of improbable mix between the Joker and Willy Wonka. The one we saw earlier this year at the cinema in The Northman had never embodied such a diabolical being and he is having a field day, modulating his voice to perfection. A role that risks sticking to him for a long time.

Too bad the movie isn’t as gripping as his performance. The script drawn by Derrickson and his accomplice C. Robert Cargill from the short story of Joe Hill (Stephen King’s son) does not shine by its originality. It is a simple variation of It. The villain with the black balloons also becomes a metaphor for the climate of violence in which our young hero evolves (convincing Mason Thames). The voices he hears on the phone will help him get rid of it…by drawing blood, of course.

Too long to get going, the initiation story captivates when it is behind closed doors. This is where the staging is most effective, developing a tension at every moment, which is not so much born of gratuitous bursts as of the care given to dark images and sound textures. A feeling of unease and melancholy which unfortunately disappears when the action returns to the police investigation and the young sister of the protagonist (vibrant Madeleine McGraw) with dreams that are a little too convenient and revealing.

The Black Phone is showing in the original version and in the French version.