In "976-EVIL," Satan's on the line and if you value your soul, you better not pick up. Or so it goes in this lame-brained horror flick directed by Mr. Freddy Krueger himself, Robert Englund, which includes a script written by Brian Helgeland and Rhet Topham. With Englund's first time behind the camera, you would expect something truly unique or at least something close to being even remotely frightening like "A Nightmare on Elm Street" (1984), but when things get interesting "976-EVIL" devolves into typical slasher/possession stuff and thus joins the ranks of so many other "B" horror movies from the 1980s.<br /><br />The movie at least has an inventive premise: dialing the title phone number puts you on a hot line with the Devil himself. A creepy voice (Englund) on the other end gives you some advice (your "horror-scope") and it pays off, but usually at a price: your soul.<br /><br />Teenage biker-punk Spike (Patrick O'Neal), an indebted gambler, is able to use the words of wisdom bestowed upon him and break free of his poker habit before the hot line's influence has a chance to truly take hold of him. His cousin, shy and repressed Hoax ("Evil Ed" Stephen Geoffreys), isn't so lucky. Bullied and unlucky with the ladies, he dials 976-EVIL and before you know it, the otherwise good boy with good morals goes from fundamentalist Christian to practicing Satanist in the time it takes for you to dial that evil number. Now a full-fledged psychopath possessed by the Devil, he soon starts growing jet-black fingernails and scales and speaking in an ever-creepy Satanic voice who has a tendency of dropping painfully unfunny one-liners that mostly fall flat on their face.<br /><br />Of course with a title like "976-EVIL," you could only expect the worst from this horror movie. The film starts off good, with one unlucky caller meeting their demise, and then the main characters are introduced but once the scares start coming, it all falls apart. But even then, it takes almost forever for that to even start.<br /><br />Geoffreys, a regular in '80s horror movies like 1985's "Fright Night," seems almost pitch-perfect as the shy kid who stood to gain some confidence with Satanic powers, but comes off instead as another rejected nerd-turned-braindead screen slasher who goes on a murderous rampage against his tormentors. There is one particularly creepy sequence where he's able to manifest a spider TV dinner upon one unfortunate victim. We should have expected better from Mr. Englund and as expected, we got less. And Joe Dante regular Robert Picardo also appears as Mark Dark, the manager of a sleazy phone-sex operation.<br /><br />"976-EVIL" - Hang up, fast!<br /><br />3/10