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Brenda's Review of 976-EVIL 1988 *Spoilers* · Brenda's Horror Movie Reviews

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Good morning, this is Brendan.
• 0:01
  SPEAKER_00: I'm back with another review, and today we're going to be reviewing 1988's 976 Evil.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_00: I was really excited about this one.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_00: It is directed by Robert Englund, who played Freddie Krueger.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: There are those out there who say that he should have just stuck to acting, but I really like the movie.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think he did a bad job with it.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: This is another one from my childhood that I haven't watched in decades.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_00: It stars Stephen Jeffries as Hoax and Patrick O'Brien as Spike, and they're cousins, but Spike has lost his parents, and so he's relying on the aunt who is holding his trust money until he turns 21.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_00: He lives in the garage apartment, kind of living like Fonzine.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_00: He has the black jacket and the motorcycle and is cool and he's protective of his cousin Hoax, who is bullied at school.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_00: Spike's aunt, who is Hoax's mom, is very religious and strict with hoax.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_00: One night Spike is hanging out in his apartment looking through a magazine and one of the blow-in cards comes out and it has a horoscope phone number that can be called, which is the 976 Evil.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: The voice on the other line is telling him that it's the caverns of the unknown and depressed 666 to get his message.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_00: And of course he does on that landline.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: The first message he gets tells him financial debts linger but not for long.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: You have the urge to take risks, don't be afraid, your prize only lies a short distance away.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_00: Claim it.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: Spike goes into the house, into the kitchen, and is trying to take money from the ant.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_00: They argue a little bit, and when Spike goes outside, it starts raining fish.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: A little later on, Spike calls that hotline again, and he gets another message.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_00: A real man has the nerve to take what he deserves, but Spike seemed to get bored with the hotline, and that's when Hoax goes in his apartment and finds that card.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_00: Hoax already has a crush on Spike's girlfriend, and he actually witnesses them having sex.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm thinking, how are you gonna like her when she has who knows what still floating around on her from Spike that night?
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_00: But hey, go get it, Hoax.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_00: So he calls the hotline, and his first message says, Out of the darkness and into the light comes your horoscope on this dark and stormy night.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_00: And then he gets one of the take what you deserve messages.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: But also while he is up there in Spike's room, he takes that girl's underwear.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_00: So he makes more calls, is told he's gonna meet his dream girl.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_00: He's got Susie's underwear in his pocket, and he runs into her outside of the movie theater because Spike starts playing some card game with his buddies and kind of leaves her hanging, that bastard.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_00: So it really seems like Susie has a soft spot for hoax and is enjoying her time with him.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_00: But then the bullies come into the pizza place and start in on him, and when they start fighting him, the underwear falls out, she sees it, knows it's hers, and that's when it all goes south for that.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_00: So rather than apologize, he already knows that she hates spiders because she freaked out over her daddy long leg.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: The hotline starts possessing him, and he is able to send a bunch of tarantulas to her and it scares her to death, so poor Susie had to die.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_00: As he gets stronger and stronger, Hoax is able to overtake the bullies and ends up killing them off.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: I think the demon makeup on him is pretty good too.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_00: He ends up killing his mom.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: She has a bunch of cats, thank goodness he doesn't kill them, but they end up feasting on mom.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_00: He does kill her pet parrot.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: As he's giving his soul to Satan, his house turns into a frozen hell.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_00: Spike is the one who ultimately has to go ahead and kill hoax.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: There's a brief moment where Spike is telling him, hey, you know, remember the vacation we were gonna take this summer?
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_00: And you see a little glimmer of hoax in there, but he's too far gone.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't mention the guidance counselor or the detective that were trying to investigate the fish, but I feel like they were just filler characters in the way.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_00: Let's go ahead and rate this movie.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: On the eerie scale, it became eerie when the portal to hell opened up in the home, the frozen wasteland.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, that's a wine glass.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_00: The environment, I'll give that a wine glass.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_00: It's a very 80s feel, which I love.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_00: Not a cell phone in sight.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_00: Evil, it gets a wine glass, it's right there in the name.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_00: And who doesn't love an 800 or a 900 number from back in the 80s and early 90s?
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_00: I'm sure there were a lot of guys calling to get some dirty talk for$3.99 a minute.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_00: And let's not forget, call me now Cleo.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_00: On the empathy scale, uh, the poor little bird, that wasn't right, but I'm only giving it half a wine glass because it wasn't a cat.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_00: Entertaining, loved it, so yes, a wine glass.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm giving this one four and a half wine glasses.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_00: I know there's people out there that won't agree with me.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_00: After its release, the Washington Post wrote, from start to finish, 976 Evil is a sorry, wrong number, and it only got a 15% approval rating from Rotten Tomatoes.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_00: It's such a great storyline, and I believe it's really underrated.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: Somebody somewhere must have liked it because they wrote a script for a second one that was released in 1992.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_00: It went straight to video.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_00: Patrick O'Brien comes back as Spike.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_00: I have yet to watch this movie, but people are starting to write in and suggest different movies, and I'm gonna start just writing them down, no particular order.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_00: Pick a movie out of the bowl.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_00: This movie's gonna make its way into the bowl.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_00: If you have a favorite 80s movie or something outside of the box, let me know what it is.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_00: You can reach me at bsstudios at myyahoo.com.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_00: The next movie is going to be 1986's April Fool's Day.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: Until then.