Don’t Hang Up (2016)

Posted by anythinghorror on 2017-03-20 · Leave a Comment

As a long time horror fan I’ve run through my share of teenage horror prank films. I figured that Don’t Hang Up would fall into the usual categories of predictable jump scares and severe mind numbing teenage antics. Directed by both Damien Mace and Alexis Wajsbrot and written by Joe Johnson, Don’t Hang Up is the tale of Brady (Garrett Clayton) and Sam (Greg Sullen) and their friends, who have a penance for cruel prank calls and posting them to the internet for millions to view. When the Brady and Sam get together for a boy’s night, they realize that one of their pranks may have gone to far and now they have become the object of one person’s revenge. As the cat and mouse game escalates, Brady and Sam soon realize they are not the only ones in the killer’s sights.

The opening scene is attention grabbing, but as the film segways into the next scenes involving the pranksters, you can feel you have gone down this same path with other movies. Thankfully it pulls itself out of this rut and manages to streamline into a solid and engrossing film. Once the killer contacts Brady and Sam, as the viewer you can feel the clock start ticking into a harrowing style of suspense. Horror fans will get a Saw and When a Stranger Calls vibe throughout, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing, when it’s executed properly, which thankfully it was.

Overall, I think this could be an easily dismissable film, due to its plot, but this is more cleverly infused than most other horror films with similar concepts. Don’t Hang Up is fast paced and stays on point, although there can be some points of contention with fans, you really shouldn’t cut the (phone)line for it. You can check out the trailer below.