Runtime: 1 hour, 36 minutes
Rating: R
Directors: Brad Anderson
Quick Impressions:
If you were idly flipping through cable channels and happened to catch The Call already in progress, you would never be able to stop watching it. Sure, maybe at some point early on, you’d intend to change the channel. But it would never happen. You’d just go on and on watching it intently until the end—when you’d suddenly snap out of your trance and realize (in fury) that you’d missed an important appointment.
The Call is one of those movies.
Last fall’s Cloud Atlas (which, though unabashedly odd, deserved better box office and critical reception than it got) reminded me that I used to love Halle Berry. So when I first starting seeing theatrical previews for The Call, I was reasonably excited. It’s good to see Halle Berry anchoring a movie again, and it’s nice to see no-longer-so-Little Miss Abigail Breslin again, too.
I never read any reviews before writing my own. But when you wait until Tuesday night to go, it’s pretty hard to find a showtime without seeing numbers from Metacritic or Rotten Tomatoes. So my husband and I went to this movie knowing that it hasn’t been getting great reviews, and that many people don’t like the ending. But we decided to see it anyway.
And I’m glad we did. This movie is highly watchable. Does somebody not like Halle Berry? Did she do something to make a bunch of critics mad? Is it just that she made the movie Catwoman? You can hardly blame the star for that mess. (And she was such a good sport and accepted her Razzie in person and everything!) I just don’t get it. Why do critics always seem to bash her movies? Most movies aren’t masterpieces, but some of them get reviewed way more harshly than others. Honestly, it starts to seem personal. I mean, yes, Berry’s had her share of (sometimes unusual) personal problems, but haven’t her detractors noticed that she is exceptionally beautiful? That degree of beauty ought to cover a multitude of sins. Plus she’s a great actress. She’s a born movie star. She has the right kind of energy to carry a Hollywood movie, and she carries this one just fine. Abigail Breslin is good, too.
The Good:
The theatrical trailer announces three pretty major things about this movie:
1) The concept is not 100 percent original. It definitely harkens back to other abduction and/or serial killer films. Basically the trailer uses familiar elements to announce itself in no uncertain terms as genre fiction. It’s not looking for awards. It’s a popcorn flick.
2) The somewhat unlikely premise (that you learn from the preview; I am not spoiling the movie here) is that Halle Berry plays a 9-1-1 operator who makes a mistake and feels responsible for the death of an innocent girl at the hands of a killer. Then later, Berry’s character takes an emergency call from another girl who has been kidnapped—by the same man!!!!!!! (Again, the preview tells you all this.) So we pretty much know not to expect gritty realism.
3) Most of the preview’s runtime is filled with huge close-ups of Halle Berry’s face. (She’s very upset by all of this. She can’t believe what has happened because of her mistake! She’s not going to let it happen again!) So there may be other people on the case and some teenager just moments from death somewhere, but make no mistake—this is a star vehicle for Halle Berry that will spend most of its time focused on her character (who has the edge when it comes to saving this girl because she has greater motivation and more knowledge of the perpetrator than anyone else around).
I say all this because while some movies have misleading previews (Flight comes to mind), this is not one of them. The film delivers every single thing that the preview promises. And then it throws in a totally wacky ending as a bonus to keep you on your toes. So if you really believe The Call deserves an entirely bad review, I think you ought to admit that you don’t like (A) Halle Berry, (B) Movies like this, or (C) Both A and B.
Berry gives a perfectly solid performance as emergency services operator Jordan Turner. This may not be the finest performance she’s ever put on film, but the movie doesn’t demand that. Berry makes Jordan seem sympathetic and trustworthy with a working moral compass and a commendable dedication to justice. She’s playing a crime-solving movie cliché—the good cop who screwed up and now needs to find the courage to redeem herself by becoming the hero who saves the day. Usually, it’s a male cop. In The Call, it’s a female 9-1-1 dispatcher. But it’s the same character, basically. And the reason we see this type of character so often is that it usually works really well on the big screen. People like heroes, especially when they overcome the emotional baggage of their past mistakes.
Abigail Breslin is very good in this movie, too, mostly because she seems so natural and convincing as a frightened (but ultimately courageous) teenaged girl. This kind of performance makes Breslin’s Oscar nomination seem all the more deserved because clearly this girl has talent. Even though Casey is facing extraordinary circumstances, Breslin doesn’t chew scenery or resort to melodrama. She’s very convincing. The performance feels effortlessly authentic. (She reminded me a bit of someone I know who is about that same age.) She just really seems like a girl who has been kidnapped and is terrified for her life. I hope Breslin starts making more movies. (She hasn’t been all that prolific recently, possibly because she’s still in school.)
Another thing that stands out about this film is its positive portrayal of the police force. Yes, I know that power corrupts, and there are plenty of bad cops out there. But it’s nice to see a film about police officers who actually want to help people and see justice served for a change. (These days, any movie that portrays religious officials or the police department in a positive light is a rare treat.) If I ever have to call the police, I hope Jordan’s boyfriend (played by Morris Chestnut) comes to help me. He seems so capable and trustworthy. The uniform looks good on him. He’s the type of policeman children expect to encounter when seeking help.
In some ways, the movie is very simplistic. It’s not about weird conspiracies or endless corruption. It’s just about people doing their jobs, and in most cases doing what they can to help other people (like most people do, I truly believe. I mean if you saw someone being kidnapped or abused, wouldn’t you call the police or—if you’re muscular and armed—try to intervene?)
I like the movie, too, because it humanizes the voice on the other end of the phone when you call 9-1-1. Like I said, this movie isn’t ground-breaking in the originality department, but I actually can’t recall ever seeing a feature film built around the 9-1-1 operator. I’ve really never thought much before about who answers the calls, and how many people answer them, and how many calls those operators must get in a major city like Los Angeles.
Also I really like the way Denise Dowse plays Halle Berry’s character’s colleague. Flora doesn’t really say or do a whole lot, but she’s always there in the background nodding and looking appropriately concerned, as if she’s thinking, Oh dear, I don’t want my friend to go crazy, and Oh no, I hate it when innocent people get brutally murdered. It’s impossible not to like her. Throughout most of the movie, Flora just sits there with a caring expression on her face, and Dowse really sells it.
The middle of the movie—when Jordan is on the phone with Casey—is by far the best part. It’s so gripping that my husband was beside himself trying to find a safe moment to run to the men’s room. Not only is it suspenseful and intense, but it also gives all of us abductable types out there (i.e. anybody) plenty of helpful hints about what to do if we ever find ourselves in a similar situation. Berry and Breslin have to make this part of the movie work, and they do. They’re both great. The part where they’re on the phone together is fantastic entertainment. And the good news is—that’s most of the movie.
As far as the “terrible” ending goes, the very last scene is pretty ludicrous, but up to that point, I think everything makes perfect sense. No kidding. What happens is basically what I expected to happen from the moment I saw the preview (which spends most of its time in a close-up of Halle Berry’s face). For Pete’s sake, even the movie poster is a giant close-up of Halle Berry’s face! What always happens to the good cop who is too emotionally invested in the case because he screwed up before, and he can’t let it happen again? If the premise itself doesn’t give you a good idea of where the movie’s headed, then the part where Jordan is briefing the new interns—“These are the rules we never, ever, ever, ever, ever break”—certainly should.
For what it’s worth, the last scene drew mixed reviews in our theater. As the credits rolled, some people in front of us clapped, and some people behind us groaned. But nobody laughed or groaned during the movie.
Best Scene Visually:
Halle Berry is beautiful. Since this movie called for ten million close-ups of Jordan’s face, I think they picked the right person for the part. (And I thought her facial expressions seemed perfectly normal, too, so she must not have Botoxed as recently as she did when she accepted her Oscar.)
This isn’t really a movie you see for the amazing visuals, but I thought Casey’s various attempts to attract attention were very interesting to watch because they offered us sights that we don’t often see. I particularly enjoyed watching her efforts at the gas station because while you’re rooting for the character, there’s also a visual novelty to her predicament.
Funniest Scene:
There is a moment near the end when Halle Berry is standing there looking heroic, and the shot is framed perfectly to showcase just her amazingness and the American flag unfurled in the breeze behind her. That did make me smile. I mean, most of the movie worked for me, but even I thought that heavy-handed cinematography was just a little much.
That said, I do think the very last scene is supposed to be funny. Now granted, some people will laugh at the movie instead of with it, but I think it’s okay to laugh with it. The scene is weird, but it’s kind of like that zany panel of a comic book where the villain gets his come-uppance, and the hero gets to toss off a maybe-not-so-witty zinger. The scene seems a little off tonally, but not so far off that it can’t work if you decide to be a good sport and work with it.
Best Scene:
“You don’t want to see what’s in that room. You won’t like it.” I can’t remember exactly how the line goes. It’s something like that.
Such emphatic teasing of the audience is so unsubtle that it pretty much won me over. Of course, we’re all dying to see what’s in that room.
The weird part is, we already kind of know. And let’s face it, we pretty much know who is going to show us. The surprising part is that when we do see, (even though it’s oddly predictable for something so strange) it still seems kind of weird and creepy. And it’s even creepier because we know (if we have any kind of ability to judge how long the movie has already been on) that we aren’t going to get an adequate explanation. This movie is not going to delve into anybody’s psyche. It’s more of a surface-only type affair where the good guys (i.e. most people) are good, and the bad guy is crazy!
Best Action Sequence:
I’ve already called out the part where Jordan and Casey are on the phone as the best part of the movie. There’s another name for that part—the middle. Yes, that part probably takes up over an hour of the total runtime, but it’s basically just one long action sequence full of suspense, danger, and intensity. That part is so good, and once you’ve seen all that, you might as well stick around for the impractical but inevitable conclusion.
The Negatives:
I think this movie works because it takes a story that is essentially formulaic and makes it exciting. Yes, of course, girls have been abducted by guys who intend to murder them before, but still, every single time that happens, it’s pretty darn exciting—especially from the victim’s point of view.
But even I will readily admit that the ending is the weakest part of the movie. Given her circumstances and all that we are shown about her, Jordan’s behavior is perfectly in character. (I’m not saying it’s perfectly logical. I’m saying it’s in keeping with what we know about her character.) But I do find it a little astonishing that with all the manpower devoted to this assignment, nobody else turned anything up. (Still it’s not completely unbelievable. It’s movie reality believable. It’s the way things always work when that tormented cop stock character gets much more emotionally invested in the case than anybody else. And he’s all like, “No! I know I’m right! I can’t believe I made a mistake this time! It wasn’t a mistake! I’m right! I don’t know how, but I can prove I’m right! ABC is still XYZ! You’ve got to believe me! Lives depend on it!” And everybody else in the movie is all like, “You’re cracking up! Get some distance! Go home! Get a hobby! Take up fishing! Find a new wife who didn’t get blown up by a drug cartel! You’re off this case! Turn in your badge!” And he’s like, “I’m on my own now!”)
Yes, the end of the movie is slightly unrealistic, but that’s mostly because the character’s behavior is so ill-advised. But the thing is, at this part, the movie is not trying to be realistic. It’s trying to be scary. And it is scary. So it’s hard to fault it too much. The poor movie is just trying to entertain the audience, and the thrill ride has to stop eventually, so The Call decides to turn into a horror movie at the last minute because otherwise it would be too short.
The character whose behavior I honestly had a huge problem with was the supervisor. Seriously, she has got to be one of the worst supervisors in the history of movies. Why in the world does she make Halle Berry take that call from Casey? Don’t 9-1-1 operators have a human resources department to be afraid of? Obviously Jordan does not feel emotionally ready to be back on the job, and there are so many other people in that room. As soon as the supervisor realizes how serious the situation is, she should relieve Jordan of duty immediately and assign someone else to the case. Don’t let the person who breaks into crazed tears the moment she says, “Hello,” be in charge in a life-or-death situation. That’s not fair to Jordan, and if this were real life and not a movie, that definitely would not be fair to Casey. What if the girl on the phone gets murdered, and somebody investigating wants to know why a 9-1-1 operator clearly suffering from post traumatic stress and still taking some kind of prescription medication for it was the one responding to the call?
Another thing that bothered me was the behavior of that one intern (Ross Gallo). Clearly, that guy was just there to be annoying, and to push buttons that needed to be pushed. I thought that was kind of lazy writing.
And why didn’t we learn more about Michael Foster (Michael Eklund)? I guess that would have just slowed things down. Still even though we’re given an adequate backstory through visual clues, I didn’t come away feeling satisfied about the character. To get a solid feel for what makes the guy tick, you sort of have to rely on your knowledge of other serial killer movies to fill in the gaps.
Overall:
The Call is consistently entertaining and—for most of its runtime—incredibly intense and suspenseful. It’s the kind of movie that will have a long life on cable (or Netflix) because once you start watching it, you really can’t look away. This is an old fashioned popcorn flick about a good cop who makes a grave mistake and attempts to work through that trauma by saving the day in a similar situation that arises later. This time, the good cop is a 9-1-1 operator played by Halle Berry, but the basic formula is the same, and it still works just fine. In a solid, sympathetic turn, Berry anchors the movie, and Abigail Breslin turns in a fine supporting performance as teen victim Casey Welson. Basically, The Call is a pretty good movie. The ending is a little kooky, but what mid-March release is perfect?