Black Phone 2

Black Phone 2
Starring Mason Thames, Madeleine McGraw, Ethan Hawke, Demian Bichir
Directed by Scott Derrickson

Back in 2022, "The Black Phone" came out and honestly, I wasn't impressed. I found the premise to be too simple - a boy gets kidnapped, and receives phone calls from the spirits of the boys the Grabber killed previously, with hints on how to make it out alive. Not only that, but his sister was psychic and had dreams of the very house he was in. It was the world's simplest escape room with every hint available, and I berated the film for it. However, as the years have passed and I've re-watched it a few times, I've grown to appreciate the film for what it is, including the performances and effects, and I would bump my original C+ rating to an A- now. All that to say I was also nervous for "Black Phone 2," because it seemed the first was a one-and-done, where all loose ends were tied up, and I felt that this was just going to be a cash grab for a property that people knew about. By the end, I was blown away by how much I enjoyed it (still much better than the original), and it's one of my favorite horror movies of the year.

Four years after Finney Blake (Mason Thames) killed the Grabber (Ethan Hawke) and escaped his prison, his sister Gwen (Madeleine McGraw) begins having dreams about three dead kids at a Christian summer camp, wanting her to find their bodies so they could rest in peace. Heading to the camp in the dead of winter, Finney, Gwen, and their friend Ernesto (Miguel Mora) find themselves stranded in a blizzard with the camp supervisor Armando (Demian Bichir), his niece Mustang (Arianna Rivas), and two employees. At the camp, Finney gets a call from a long-dead payphone from the spirit of the Grabber, who's returned to get revenge by attacking Gwen in her dreams. As Finney, Gwen, and the others begin to piece together why the Grabber has come back now and his connection with the camp, they find long-dead secrets from their own past as well, as the Grabber continues his rampage from beyond the grave.

"The Black Phone" was a very grounded horror movie with some supernatural elements, while the sequel is a supernatural movie with some grounded moments. It's a mixture that typically doesn't work, but under the watchful eye of director and writer Scott Derrickson and the returning cast, it's not just believable - but even more tense. Unlike the first film, not everything is perfectly laid out, and the stakes are amped up to eleven as Finney and Gwen find themselves under attack from a now-supernatural Grabber who can't easily be defeated in his noncorporeal form. This time, there's no easy outs, no hints, no nothing - just the struggle to survive against someone who can't seemingly be stopped.

Sure, this is essentially "A Nightmare on Elm Street," but there's a reason Freddy Krueger is so feared: everyone has to sleep, and that's when he strikes. For Gwen, when she sleeps and dreams, the Grabber comes out and tortures and torments her. Switching from Finney to Gwen as the victim is a bold move but works, allowing Madeleine McGraw to showcase her talent in terrific ways. No longer a young child, the actress (who's sister, Violet, had her own horror sequel this year as well with M3GAN 2.0) more than rises to the occasion, showing talent beyond her years and giving Gwen a more grown-up feel while also keeping her foul mouth she's known for from the first film. It's a delicate tightrope balance, and McGraw traverses it like an expert trapeze artist. 

Although relegated to the foreground, Mason Thames still has a lot to work with as Finney, as even four years after his ordeal, he's still struggling with his own dreams of what happened to him in that basement. It's a grounded look at how people deal with grief and trauma, as Finney drowns himself in pot to forget the past because he's afraid to face it, and in doing so has become a bitter, angry person. Yet when Gwen's life is on the line, Finney once again steps up to fight the Grabber in his own way, and in doing so help Gwen in the process.

The strength of both of these films comes down to the actors, and as I stated earlier, both Mason Thames and Madeleine McGraw excel in their roles in both films, but the glue that holds it all together is Ethan Hawke's portrayal of the Grabber (which, oddly enough, is Hawke's first villainous role in his decades' long career). The first film saw the Grabber as a psychopath who has a layered storyline as to why he chooses to abduct the boys he does, and the games he plays with him. Now, he's unrestrained from the mortal coil, and is allowed to exude the Grabber's full villainous nature, making him even more scary than the original. 

The original movie was based off a novel written by Joe Hill (Stephen King's son), and he never wrote a sequel, which is why I was apprehensive for this second film. Yet Derrickson and co-writer C. Robert Cargill eased my fears by making the sequel a seamless sequel that continued the story of the Grabber, Finney, and Gwen and their histories in ways that didn't feel tacked on or added in for effect, but in the grand scheme of the two movies made sense in a logical, natural fashion. To that end, I give the film unending credit.

The cinematography is also excellent, as when we're treated to Gwen's dreams the camera changes from normal to grainy, giving an even more terrifying feel as we experience her dreams and nightmares. The effects are also amped up, as we see the three dead children with all their bloody wounds, which is surprisingly unnerving considering they're children and not something we typically see in a horror movie (especially Gwen's first dream at the camp, which is pure nightmare fuel and something you'd never expect from a major studio film). Then there's the camerawork that makes it look like one long take, especially when Finney answers the phone at the camp with the three dead kids in the background before appearing on all sides of the phone booth in what seems like a continuous take. Mix that with one unbeatable setting - a summer camp in the middle of winter, during the worst blizzard in recent memory, leaving them stranded and without hope of rescue, and you've got an exceptional horror sequel that far exceeds the original in every way.

The Score: A+