THE CALL - 8/10

Holy fucking intense! I don't remember the last time I was so on the edge of my seat during a movie. Breslin was fantastic in this and Berry was very good as well. It isn't anything new, but it knows what it is set out to do and it does it very, very well.

THE CALL

The trailer got me hooked on watching this and it was quite entertaining. I ended it up watching this at a screening last week and the crowd was very into it. The type of crowd that does the "oh no's" or "watch out" type of speaking. The trailer gives it all away essentially but the film still captures the intensity of the first 911 call that turns sour and fast forward 6 months and we get the ultimate 911 call. Halle Berry and Breslin were both very good. That whole kidnapping sequence seemed to play in almost real time. Anyway, the film was very enjoyable and crowd pleasing.

Grade - B

I disagree that the trailer gives everything away. There was a large portion of the film that wasn't in the trailer (at least, I can't remember anyway). I thought it gave just enough away to get people interested but kept enough surprises for the film.

Anyway, I am seeing another screening of this tomorrow night with my boyfriend and my stepmom. I'm excited. This movie was so much fun and seeing it with an awesome audience makes it that much more fun.

Suitably intense, though the final act is predictably stupid, even if the final twist is pretty ballsy and unexpected. Still, I enjoyed it overall.

Here's what we call a movie that does its job in a perfectly serviceable fashion without striving for more. Sometimes that's really all you want, and The Call is a satisfactory thriller. It's suspenseful and tense throughout, and anchored by strong work from Halle Berry (and Abigail Breslin as well). The final act devolves into a bag of nonsense, but come on...that's happened with essentially every Hollywood studio thriller for the last 20 years so it's hard to complain. B

The ending was pretty surprising. I dug it

It may be a by-the-numbers thriller but it's really entertaining and delivers on the thrills. Highly enjoyed it. Both Berry and especially Breslin were very good in it. Loved the ending. I'd give it a solid B+.

What an enjoyable little thriller The Call turned out to be - - it's great to see one that knows it's a b-movie and is proud of it!

The fact that they got the "reality" portion of the film out of the way in the first half was the secret that saved this from being another earnest and routine procedural. Once The Call leapt off the logic cliff, it soared towards the Crazytown airport on a most deliciously twisted flight path.

They used to make a ton of this type of movie back in the day - - modest budget, edge-o-yer-seat, countdown mysteries that are built on a clever story - - it was great to see one in this age of dour big budget crapfests.


27 out of 5.

Great little thriller that kind of reminds me of Cellular, not on the story but on the suspenseful and thrilling. Very entertaining although the last mins of the film where just plain stupid, predictable and awesome at the same time

B

[b]B[b/]


Really intense thriller.

During the actual call, as the initial abduction unfolds and much of the action is set in the 9-1-1 call center, I found this to be a modest entertainment. Minor and B grade through and through, but a neat and well-paced in-the-moment staging of a nightmare situation we often see on the news. The third act is a complete disaster, though. It represents a complete failure of imagination, from the abandonment of the central limited-space-and-time concept in favor of the main character becoming an unconvincing action heroine to the groan worthy revelation of the antagonist's stale pop-psychology motivation (not to mention his elaborate and surgery ready underground lair, so clearly production designed as to be hilarious). And then there is the final scene, which believes it is a clever and rousing girl-power twist, but is truly, in equal measure, idiotic, repugnant, and forced beyond belief: even within the self-contained context and "logic" of the film, I do not believe for a second the Halle Berry character would deny the police the chance to investigate, determine as best they can the extent of his criminal activity, and perhaps provide closure to an untold number of grieving families. Are these bitches Jigsaw?

C

Studio: The first 50 pages aren't half bad! But can you produce nothing but shit for the last 30?
Writers: (smiling malevolently) ...it's already done.

The Call

Despite its flaws, I had a blast with this. I love these solo thrillers that Halle Berry is doing from time to time. This, Kidnap, and Gothika are all good. I hope she continues to make more, and preferably about kidnapping!

Michael Eklund is fantastic as the kidnapper. Unpredictable crazy is the worst kind, and he masters that here. As for the film itself, it is obviously flawed in certain ways, such as it has to be the 911 operators boyfriend that is leading the hunt for the missing teenager. And he is only a police officer. Not, as far as I can make out, a ranking police officer. Wouldn't the FBI be handling this case by now anyway? So there are conveniences and stuff that make you roll your eyes. But the film is a non-stop thrill ride, especially when Halle Berry is hiding behind the wardrobe door.

The ending is the worst part. I can forgive it because it's what the audience wants to see, but it does not follow anything that precedes it. Suddenly, Abigail Breslin is not a scared little virgin, she is calculated and able to control her sobbing enough to act out her revenge.

B