Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

Devil May Call

Collapse
X
Collapse
  •  
    Andrew S
    Member

  • Devil May Call



    Released by Lionsgate
    Released on: March 10, 2015
    Directed by: Jason Cuadrado
    Cast: Corri English, Van Hansis, Traci Lords, Tyler Mane, Traci Perez
    Year: 2013
    Purchase From Amazon

    The Movie:

    It is the final night at the current Here to Help suicide prevention call-in center. The organization is moving to a new building and for the original location's last hurrah a skeleton crew is operating the phones. Among the final four employees in the building are new hire, Jess (Van Hansis), resident cat lover, Val (Traci Lords), secretary, Jules (Traci Perez) and the departing Sam (Corri English), who happens to be blind. Sam has a troubled past and she feels this helps her communicate more clearly with the callers. One such caller is John (Tyler Maine). He is a regular caller and always asks for Sam by name. John has come to depend on her to help him with his violent outbursts. Everything at the call center is running smoothly until John accidently learns his favorite chatting friend is leaving her job. This news drives John to his most extreme outburst yet.

    Watching Devil May Call I could not help but be distracted by how dumb writer/director Jason Cuadrado made his characters. The call-in center appeared to be located in a populated downtown area. When John entered the building with intent to kill, it would have been easy for Sam, Jess, and Val to escape to a somewhat busy street for safety. However, for some reason the trio felt it would have been better to hang around and wait for John to strike. This logic gap was not the only head scratcher in the film. A previously never-before-mentioned security guard shows up more than halfway through the film. Cuadrado dropped this character into the film out of nowhere for three reason, to create a false scare, to have an extra kill, and to extend the length of the film. This is just lazy filmmaking. While these incidents were bothersome, the film had a couple redeeming values.

    For the most part, the acting was better than expected. Neither English nor Hansis have long, bright futures ahead of them, but both were very watchable. In fact, English was quite good as the blind hero. She was not strong enough to make us care about her ordeal but she was believable as a blind person. It was great fun to see Lords show up. She, as a cat lady, was what counted for comedy relief in the film and she handled the part pretty well. She was a more polished performer and possessed a professionalism the other actors lacked. Mane has a great look and could have been a great horror heavy 25 to 30 years ago. He is a strong, intimidating presence, perfect for a horror film.

    Unfortunately Cuadrado's horrible dialogue was working against all the actors. Social critic Hannah Arendt once noted Nazi Adolf Eichmann spoke only in clichés, Cuadrado writes his characters in the same way. Their dialogue was straight out of a screenwriting 101 class. John must have called humanity insects at least 100 times. Another positive for the film was the deserted call-in center. This location provides a reasonable explanation for the characters to be in an empty building with limited props and lighting. The setting also gave Devil May Call an Assault on Precinct 13 vibe which was really appreciated.

    Video/Audio/Extras:

    Lions Gate's DVD release of Devil May Call showcases the film in an anamorphic 1.78:1 presentation. The image quality is decent, but unremarkable. The film's cinematography is rather uninspired and that creates a bland, and occasionally ugly, picture. The DVD is given a 5.1 Dolby Digital audio option. The mix was pretty poor with the music overpowering the dialogue. Luckily, English and Spanish subtitle options were offered.

    Surprisingly, the DVD was given a handful of extras. The primary extra is an audio commentary track with Cuadrado. This is a basic track with the director giving background information on the film. Also included is Monstrous Nature, a short film by Cuadrado. This film, like the main feature, was pretty dumb and had a pretentious ending. The short focuses on a nun and werewolfesque creature having a conversation in the woods. The best extra is a three minute piece on the film's score with the composer Nicholas Pike playing the main theme on a wheel harp. The score seems to work best when it is divorced from the film's visuals. The extras are rounded out by the film's trailer.

    The Final Word:

    A nice location and decent acting is brought down by a poorly written script. The film is only 84 minutes and probably would have been better at half the length. There just was not enough there to warrant the running time. Devil May Call is slow moving and too long. Jason Cuadrado should have asked for help on a script rewrite.











      Posting comments is disabled.

    Latest Articles

    Collapse

    • Hot Spur (Severin Films) Blu-ray Review
      Ian Jane
      Administrator
      by Ian Jane


      Released by: Severin Films
      Released on: April 30th, 2024.
      Director: Lee Frost
      Cast: Joseph Mascolo, Virginia Goodman, John Alderman
      Year: 1969
      Purchase From Amazon

      Hot Spur – Movie Review:

      Director Lee Frost and Producer Bob Cresse's film, Hot Spur, opens in Texas in 1869 with a scene where a pair of cowboys wanders into a bar where they call over a pretty Mexican waitress and coerce her into dancing for them. She obliges, but
      ...
      03-22-2024, 11:53 AM
    • Death Squad (Mondo Macabro) Blu-ray Review
      Ian Jane
      Administrator
      by Ian Jane


      Released by: Mondo Macabro
      Released on: April 9th, 2024.
      Director: Max Pecas
      Cast: Thierry de Carbonnières, Jean-Marc Maurel, Denis Karvil, Lillemour Jonsson
      Year: 1985
      Purchase From Amazon

      Death Squad – Movie Review:

      Also known as Brigade Of Death, French sleaze auteur Max Pecas’ 1985 film, Death Squad, opens with a night time scene outside of Paris in the Bois de Boulogne Forest where cars pass by a small gang of transsexual
      ...
      03-22-2024, 11:46 AM
    • Roommates (Quality X) Blu-ray Review
      Ian Jane
      Administrator
      by Ian Jane


      Released by: Quality X
      Released on: February 28th, 2024.
      Director: Chuck Vincent
      Cast: Samantha Fox, Vernoica Hart, Kelly Nichols, Jerry Butler, Jamie Gillis
      Year: 1982
      Purchase From Amazon

      Roommates – Movie Review:

      Directed by Chuck Vincent and released in 1982, Roommates opens with a scene where a young woman named Joan Harmon (Veronica Hart) gets a hotel room with an older man named Ken (Don Peterson, credited as Phil Smith),
      ...
      03-15-2024, 01:10 PM
    • Night Of The Blood Monster (Blue Underground) UHD/Blu-ray Review
      Ian Jane
      Administrator
      by Ian Jane


      Released by: Blue Underground
      Released on: March 26th, 2024.
      Director: Jess Franco
      Cast: Christopher Lee, Maria Rohm, Dennis Price
      Year: 1970
      Purchase From Amazon

      Night Of The Blood Monster – Movie Review:

      Directed by Jess Franco, The Bloody Judge (or, Night Of The Blood Monster, as it is going by on this new release from Blue Underground) isn't quite the salacious exercise in Eurotrash you might expect it to be, and while it
      ...
      03-15-2024, 01:07 PM
    • Phase IV (Vinegar Syndrome) UHD/Blu-ray Review
      Ian Jane
      Administrator
      by Ian Jane


      Released by: Vinegar Syndrome
      Released on: March 26th, 2024.
      Director: Saul Bass
      Cast: Nigel Davenport, Michael Murphy, Lynne Frederick, Alan Gifford, Robert Henderson, Helen Horton
      Year: 1974
      Purchase From Amazon

      Phase IV – Movie Review:

      Saul Bass’ 1974 sci-fi/thriller Phase IV is an interesting blend of nature run amuck stereotypes and Natural Geographic style nature footage mixed into one delicious cocktail of suspense and
      ...
      03-15-2024, 01:02 PM
    • The Bounty Hunter Trilogy (Radiance Films) Blu-ray Review
      Ian Jane
      Administrator
      by Ian Jane


      Released by: Radiance Films
      Released on: March 26th, 2024.
      Director: Shigehiro Ozawa, Eiichi Kudo
      Cast: Tomisaburo Wakayama, Minoru Ôki, Arashi Kanjuro, Bin Amatsu, Chiezo Kataoka
      Year: 1969-1972
      Purchase From Amazon

      The Bounty Hunter Trilogy – Movie Review:

      Radiance Films gathers together the three films in Toie Studios’ Bounty Hunter Trilogy, starring the inimitable Tomisaburo Wakayama. Here’s how the three movies in this
      ...
      03-13-2024, 11:30 AM
    Working...
    X