|
BLACK PHONE 2 Director: Scott Derrickson Cast: Mason Thames, Madeleine McGraw, Ethan Hawke, Demián Bichir, Miguel Mora, Jeremy Davies, Arianna Rivas, Anna Lore, Graham Abbey, Maev Beaty MPAA
Rating: Running Time: 1:54 Release Date: 10/17/25 |
Review by Mark Dujsik | October 16, 2025 Black Phone 2 is about as logical a follow-up to the 2022 original as one could expect. After all, there was little logic to the particulars of The Black Phone, which combined the story of a serial killer, a coming-of-age tale, and plenty of supernatural stuff through the lens of a twisted bit of nostalgia. That film was a dark and disturbing game, and director Scott Derrickson played it so well that the material's inherent inconsistencies and lack of much depth didn't really matter. Derrickson returns as both director and co-screenwriter, along with C. Robert Cargill (who also co-wrote the first film), and with the short story from Joe Hill in this film's rearview, the filmmakers get to head in their own, even stranger direction. The sequel clears up some things and adds some new elements that only further confound, so it is, in its illogical way, a fine way to continue a story that, again, didn't have much logic in the first place. The biggest challenge, of course, is how to make a second film about a villain who was killed at the end of the first one. He was—and, as is eventually revealed, still sort of remains—"the Grabber," a child abductor and murderer played by Ethan Hawke. The character and Hawke's performance, often hidden behind a skeletal mask, were chilling because one could sense some vulnerability, some pain, and some regret in the Grabber's moments of clarity. Without saying too much too soon about his incarnation in this entry, let's just say that any of those meeker and, well, human qualities are gone when the Grabber does finally return here. Initially, the film is smart to remind us that the other characters of the original existed outside of the main plot. There was Finney (Mason Thames), who would become the Grabber's final kidnapping and the serial killer's final end. Before that, he was just a teenager who felt very small and insignificant in the face of bullies and his alcoholic, abusive father (It is encouraging to see that the father, played by Jeremy Davies, is sober and attentive towards his kids). Even though he had some supernatural help from the Grabber's other victims by way of a mysterious phone, Finney stood up for himself entirely on his own to defeat the killer. When we meet him again four years later, he appears to have become a bully himself. He may be older, but there's still a bit of that scared kid from before in Finney—only now he responds to it with anger that he can't necessarily control. Meanwhile, Finney's younger sister Gwen (Madeleine McGraw), whose mysterious dreams helped her and the police find the basement where her brother was being held captive, is still dreaming, now sleepwalking, and not sure what her visions mean or if they'll ever stop. The dreams—of her late mother as a teenager and some murdered children—lead her, Finney, and Ernesto (Miguel Mora), the brother of Finney's friend who was killed by the Grabber, to a camp by a lake. They arrive in the middle of a terrible Coloradan blizzard, and soon enough, Finney starts getting phone calls from the dead kids from Gwen's dreams. This is a lot of setup for what once again becomes a twisted web of ideas, plotting, and horror conceits. It starts as a murder mystery, as the siblings try to piece together what happened to the three boys who were murdered at camp a couple of decades prior. Demián Bichir plays the camp's owner, who worked there when the children went missing and has made it his life's goal to find their bodies. Before any notion of suspicious red herrings comes into play, Finney gets a phone call from a familiar voice. It's the Grabber, who has literally gone through hell, lost any sense of humanity, and somehow returned as, basically, a ghost to exact revenge on the boy who killed him. It is best, of course, not to ask how—or even if—any of this makes any sense, especially once the Grabber gains the power of existing both in dreams and, as an invisible but tangible presence, in the real world. The first film got away with its hodgepodge of concepts by feeling grounded in Finney's evolution as a character and the way Derrickson presented its nostalgia through a shattered lens. To a slightly lesser extent, this one gets away with its even more convoluted and out-there collection of conceits, in part, because we're expecting such swings from the existence of the first film and, mostly, because this one keeps throwing new things at us. There's simply no time to think about the assorted gimmicks in the moment, as Derrickson uses 16 mm film (or a convincing-enough digital equivalent) to give Gwen's dreams an eerie aura accompanied by scratchy silence on the soundtrack, Finney must face his greatest fear and source of trauma, and the Grabber reveals new paranormal talents and his presence in the lives of these characters from before they even knew he existed. It helps that the performances from Thames and especially McGraw, whose Gwen has nearly equal footing as Finney this time, show a lot of growth from the actors, making the resolution here surprisingly moving. To be sure, Black Phone 2 is a lesser effort than its predecessor, but in its own way, the sequel is almost as admirable as a game. It takes a good amount of skill to make something this nonsensical seem as if it makes perfect sense on its own terms. Copyright © 2025 by Mark Dujsik. All rights reserved. |
Buy Related Products |