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976 Evil is the phone number that foolish types dial for a daily dose of their “Horrorscope”, not only because of the horrendous premium-rate charges, but also because those who make a deal with the devil and then turn their back on it end up dying in mysterious circumstances, as can be seen in the picture below.
Spike (Patrick O’Bryan) first takes an unhealthy interest in it when he loses a stack of cash in a card game, can’t cough up and faces losing his precious motorbike to pay it back. He shares a house with his cousin, the unfortunately-named Hoax (Stephen Geoffreys) – the movie world’s answer to The Simpsons‘ Ralph Wiggum – and Hoax’s mother.
Reporter Marty (Jim Metzler) gets interested in their place when the god-fearing woman calls him after fish rain down from the sky one night. She’s convinced it’s a sign. He’s convinced she needs serious medical help, but what’s it really all about and who’s running this spooky phone service? Could it be connected with oddball Mark Dark (Star Trek: DS9 and Wonder Years regular Robert Picardo) ?
Of course, you can tell the 976-Evil answering machine is phoney because it doesn’t keep you on the line for hours detailing all their other great numbers first (!)
“Ok, I promise never to light my farts again!”
What we have here is a bog-standard open-matte 4:3 print which is nothing to shout about. It doesn’t have any noticeable artifacts, but looks rather too dark most of the time and has about as much quality as a typical American TV movie on Channel 5. The average bitrate is a steady 5.8Mb/s.
The sound is plain stereo, with dialogue a bit on the muffled side sometimes and the occasional tune being rather tinny.
“Well done. Great attempt at a first shave!”
Chapters: Just a mere 8 chapters over the 95-minute running time which isn’t nearly enough.
Languages & Subtitles: English in stereo with no subtitles.
Photo gallery: The sole extra – 10 simple stills from the film, 3 of which appear in this review. Fine to look at once, but not something you’ll go back to.
The main menu has an animation of a beating heart with some ghoulish sounds going on, but it’s nothing compared to the excellent menu for Hellbound: Hellraiser II.
“No, I said I wanted ELOCUTION lessons!”
So, a bad film with its only saving grace being Spike’s Dedee Pfeiffer-esque girlfriend Suzie (Lezlie Deane), who realises that calories are the least of her worries when she cooks up a microwaved TV dinner.
However, that boon is diluted completely when the film turns out to be so badly censored that the more gross parts are completely removed and scenes jump inexplicably so that they no longer make sense. One minute a guy was lying unconscious on the floor, next a loud voice starting screaming as their hand was being ripped off. Crap continuity abounds too – one guy is impaled on a cinema’s neon billboard which frazzles the whole thing. A few minutes later and the camera is on the cinema again, but ooh look, the guy’s gone and the lights arerestored(!)
In addition, with poor picture and sound and next-to-no extras, they should be charging people to take this away!
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FILM CONTENT PICTURE QUALITY SOUND QUALITY EXTRAS |
1 3 3 1 |
| OVERALL | 2 |
Detailed specs:
Cert: 
Running time: 95 minutes
Studio: Digital Entertainment
Cat.no: DED 6074
Year: 1988
Released: 1999
Region(s): 2, PAL
Chapters: 8
Languages: English
Subtitles: None
Fullscreen: 4:3
16:9-enhanced: No
Macrovision: Yes
Disc Format: DVD 5
Director: Robert Englund
Producer: Lisa M Hansen
Screenplay: Brian Helgeland and Rhet Topham
Music: Thomas Chase and Steve Rucker
Cast:
Hoax: Stephen Geoffreys
Marty: Jim Metzler
Angela: María Rubell
Spike: Patrick O’Bryan
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.