Spike and Hoax are cousins. Spike is the ultra cool stud and Hoax (Stephen Geoffreys AKA Evil Ed), is the little nerd we all know and love to pick on. Hoax who dreams to be his ultra cool cousin can't catch a break. He lives with his aunt Lucy, a religious zealot, and he just lost his motorcycle to a bunch of bullies. All that is about to change for Hoax after he finds a number for a horror-scope, get it? HA. Hoax dials 976-EVIL and gets his fortune, but too soon does young Hoax become addicted to the hot line. The more Hoax calls the more he begins to change and soon goes after all that have wronged him.

First off, most of you younger folks are probably like “what is a "976" number?” Well before there was the internet it was how us old timers met hot babes on hotline chat rooms and had good old phone sex. You could also call the freak line with Freddy Freak to talk about all sorts of things.

Anyway as Hoax calls the line he becomes more and more possessed by a phone demon, probably the same one that infects my wife.

However it is not until a fish falls from the sky that a reporter/priest gets involved and begins to catch on to what’s going on around town. And yes, you read that correctly, a fish falls from the sky. This one is pretty bad. Typical nerd becomes demon and goes after bullies movie. I was hoping for a lot from this one because I loved Geoffreys in Fright Night, but Hoax is nowhere as cool as Evil Ed, but then who is? Aunt Lucy provides the old coot you love to hate and Marty the priest/reporter is about as bland as a hero can get. There is some good gore and a couple of good kill scenes, but nothing that will surprise anyone. Directed by Robert Englund this one could have been done a little better, but hey what can you expect from 80’s horror?

3/10

Here is a film that suffered, in my opinion, because of poor character development. The story was fine and, for the time in question, relevant.

There were a lot of people who made phone calls to 976 numbers. I was among them but I can't remember what subject the number I called dealt with.

Anyway getting back to character development, with the exception of Hoax and Spike, there was little to no development of characters that played significant roles in the film. For example, the principal of the school that Hoax and Spike attended was in the the film for about 10 minutes total. Of those 10 minutes, the majority of her screen time was at the end during the final confrontation with Hoax. She just shows up with Marty and we are led to assume that the two have a relationship. Who cares?!?

There was not much gore at all and a character just thrown in to a scene out of nowhere to get killed (the girl with the bullys). Overall, a really poor effort but a film that I think would be a good candidate for a remake. The new writer would have to change the 976 angle with something more current and this time develop the characters so that the audience knows them and cares for them.

1 out of 10 argyle sweater wearing demons