Black Phone

Somehow overly tame and also too nasty to want to watch again, Scott Derrickson’s Black Phone is typical of many Joe Hill stories in its promising premise but so-so execution.

Filmed in Wilmington — standing in for 1970s Denver — each appealing aspect gets diluted to some degree, from Ethan Hawke giving the bulk of his creepy performance as child kidnapper/murderer “The Grabber” from behind a handful of sadistic masks, to the muddled mythology of the titular receiver, through which abductee Finney (Mason Thames, For All Mankind) receives hints from past victims on how to escape his captor.

Along the way, Derrickson crafts a few great jump scares and the film overall is plenty atmospheric, but his script with C. Robert Cargill is thoroughly half-cooked and tip-toes around such intriguing concepts as Finney’s little sister Gwen (Madeleine McGraw, Ant-Man and The Wasp) receiving visions and the dynamics between “The Grabber” and his amateur detective brother Max (James Ransone).

The clumsy way in which these various strands intersect suggest an overly faithful adaptation of flawed source material, yet the overall competence on display generally sustains viewer investment in this grisly narrative, all the way through its quasi-laughable conclusion.

Grade: C. Rated R. Now playing at AMC River Hills 10, Carolina Cinemark, and Regal Biltmore Grande.

(Photo: Universal Pictures)