Hoax Wilmoth (Stephen Geoffreys) is a nerdy high school student who lives with his mother, Lucy (Sandy Dennis). Lucy is a religious overbearing zealot. Living in a small outbuilding on the same property is Hoax’s juvenile delinquent cousin, Spike Johnson (Patrick O’Bryan). Hoax uses a makeshift pneumatic tube system to send notes to Spike. Spike often takes pity on his cousin when he is being bullied but is not above a little bullying himself.
Spike finds a flyer in a magazine that says to call 976-EVIL for your “horrorscope”. Spike dials the number and gets a cryptic message about taking risks and gaining money. Later he is caught stealing money from Lucy that she keeps in a fish statue. When Spike and Lucy argue fish begin raining down on the house. Lucy thinks it is a sign from God. Back in his room, Spike calls the 976 number again and gets another weird message. The messages begin to tell him to commit crimes. Bored with it all, Spike goes about his life.
Marty Palmer (Jim Metzler) is a reporter from Modern Miracle Magazine. He visits Lucy to get the scoop on the raining fish for his magazine. He tries to interview Spike but doesn’t get very far. Marty goes to the school and talks to the principal, Angela Martinez (Maria Rubell). Marty’s investigation eventually brings him to the company the sends out the flyers, “After Dark Enterprises”. The company is a pay-per-call place that provides chat lines for various things like horoscopes. At the company Marty talks to the owner, Mark Dark (Robert Picardo). Mark tells him that the horoscope line was an automated system that didn’t work out. He says the line has been inactive for a few months.
In the meantime, Hoax found the flyer and began calling the number. Hoax is unaware that the number is a line to Satan. He begins following the instructions on the phone to take revenge on those that he believes have hurt him. As people begin to die in weird ways, Hoax gets more and more possessed.
“976-EVIL” was released in 1988 and was directed by Robert Englund. It is an American supernatural horror film with dark comedy elements. A sequel titled “976-EVIL 2: The Astral Factor” was released in 1991.
The movie has a similar concept as “Evilspeak” 1981 and “Horror High” 1974 where the school wimp gets harassed by juvenile delinquents and the wimp gets revenge on the delinquents. It’s actually not a bad little horror film.
There are a lot of references to Satan in the film. Spike’s ‘usual’ at the diner is a deviled egg sandwich, using the word horrorscope instead of horoscope, the name Mark Dark for the chat-line business owner, the movie theater is called The Diablo, the coffee shop is called the Dante, Suzie has a snack box labeled Devil Twins in her kitchen, to name a few.
In the 80’s phone numbers with the 976 exchange were a pay-per-call number where people could get various recordings and live representatives for useless information such as psychic readings, horoscopes, joke-of-the-day, sport scores, chats with Santa Claus and even live sex talk. Eventually they gave rise to the 900 pay-per-call lines for businesses. Callers were charged various amounts by the minute, or any part of. They eventually went by the wayside due to government regulations against scammers and the rise of the internet.
This was Director Englund’s first film as director. It is also where he met his wife, Nancy Booth. She was the set director on the film. Englund was also the voice of the devil on the phone.