The Caller - B-

Quick Hit: A movie I wasn’t expecting to enjoy, but mostly did throughout.

The horror genre has been thoroughly diluted over the years. The concept of a “Scream Queen” has gone so far that we are now parodying the concept and making a tv show out of it. That’s not necessarily bad, because the best things in life are things that can laugh at themselves and still survive. ​​However, in a time when we see so many remakes, it’s difficult to see originality. I really thought that’s what I was going into when I popped in The Caller. However, I was pleasantly surprised, as this was far from the straightforward “woman alone in a house plot”.

The movie follows a young woman named Mary Kee (played by Rachelle Lefevre of Twilight and Under the Dome fame) as she moves into an apartment to escape an abusive ex-husband named Steve (played by Ed Quinn). The apartment is grungy, despite a beautiful garden, strangely tended to by Luis Guzman (his character name is unimportant – it’s Luis Guzman). Once there, she begins to receive calls from a woman named Ruth. After time, she realizes that Ruth’s calls are coming from the past – specifically, 1979 when Ruth was a young woman dating an abusive man.

Told you - Luis Guzman.

If this sounds sort of familiar, it’s because it’s eerily similar to the idea of the movie Frequency (starring Dennis Quaid and Jim Caviezel) – the idea that a communications device (in Frequency it’s a ham radio, here it’s an old style rotary phone) can communicate across time. As I’ve said before, my love of good time travel stories is unmatched by some. What I think really makes this one interesting is that it shows some of what Looper showed – the ability to make instant changes in the future that are caused by events in the past.

The movie, however, does have its issues. The script itself isn’t great, and there are long, long pauses that are meant to build tension, but at times, allow the well-built tension to slowly eek away. The acting is mixed. Ed Quinn does a decent job as the crazy ex, but you really don’t understand his motivations at all (I suppose it’s hard to understand the motivations of an abuser). Ms. Lefevre does an admirable job at bringing up the script to be a bit better, but The Caller is never better than when it builds on the contrast between the two threats Mary is facing: the supernatural one that involves Rose and the real life one that involves Steve.

I will also say that despite the fact that there was a romance in it, I didn't believe it at all. Cut that out of the movie and it would have been better for it.

I have to discuss the ending here, but it will be brief, so spoilers!
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This movie wasn’t terribly original, as I’ve touched on a couple of times. The ending was the same. Despite the fact that there a numerous plot holes in here, I’ll forgive them, but my main complaint is this… Did it have to be a bathroom? It’s like we’re trying to purposely make this 

ending as much like the Shining as possible. All that was missing was Nicholson’s classic “Here’s Johnny!” line.

Overall, The Caller is a pretty mixed back. It’s suspenseful at times, boring at others, but tends to bring you back into the fold on more than one occasion. And, it’s about time travel (sort of) so that’s always a win. I’m going to give The Caller a “B-“.

For more on this film, check out IMDB.