“Mr. Harrigan’s Phone” Movie Review
Ryan Murphy, Blumhouse Productions, and Netflix walk into a room with a Stephen King novella adaptation and a first generation iPhone in hand.
At first, the rights to a novella by one the most lauded horror authors in existance in the hands of horror production legends smells of critical acclaim.
Yet, this film ultimately smelled of poor social commentary and nonexistant character development, despite impressive performances by the lead actors Jaeden Martell and Donald Sutherland.
“Mr. Harrigan’s Phone” is a recent release by author Stephen King and is lost among Mr. King’s large body of work. The novella was adapted and directed by John Lee Hancock who is known for directing “The Blind Side” and “The Rookie.”
The film takes place in a small town in Maine, recounting the story of a lonely teenager, Craig (played by Jaeden Martell), and his relationship with billionaire, Mr. Harrigan (played by Donald Sutherland).
The story begins when Mr. Harrigan- whose sight is failing- hires a young Craig to read him novels three times a week. The two become close as Craig ages into a teenager, and Craig becomes the lonely old man’s only friend.
In celebration of their friendship, Craig buys the billionaire an iPhone shortly before the old man croaks.
Despite Mr. Harrigan’s death, Craig discovers he can still contact his friend beyond the grave through the iPhone he tucked into Mr. Harrigan’s coffin.
This supernatural line of communication leads to strange occurrences in Craig’s quaint town as he faces a new horror: surviving high school.
Visually, this film had great composition and color story throughout. The scenes located in Mr. Harrigan’s house mastered depth and proved the filmmakers paid close attention to best utilize their locations.
Also, the actors' efforts to save this disappointing adaptation are apparent and recognized, so they will not be criticized for the mess they were ultimately a part of.
These are the only positive elements of this film.
The main issues and arguably the most important element of a small cast horror is the messaging.
The movie attempted to tackle commentary on society's unhealthy relationship with phones and isolation perpetuated by obsession.
Attempted is the key word here.
Instead of using visual examples to further this theme, most of the film's messaging consists of monologues and voice overs by the characters.
The monologues add no insight or complexity and choose instead to propagate that phones are bad, instead of focusing on exploring relationships affected by phones .
This is likely due to uncertainty over what the movie's direction should be: a lighthearted horror or an existential drama.
There were too many slightly humorous moments and not enough scary elements to consider it a horror.
However, the plot is so bare and far from exciting calling it a thriller or drama feels wrong.
Overall, it was boring.
Going into this, I expected a bit of a mess.
From the beginning, there was a glaringly obvious problem: the work is a short story and this is a full length film.
I believe if this was condensed into a 30 minute episode or short film that the messaging would have been more effective.
Much of the run time is scenes that have little to no purpose other than getting from plot point A to plot point B.
Even the plot point’s themselves end up having no effect on the story progression or character choices.
Ultimately, the main character doesn’t really learn anything.
The only piece of growth the audience can visibly see in Craig is to leave the dead to rest and leave baggage behind.
Thus, this film left me disappointed at the wasted opportunity to explore an interesting theme.
The only people I would recommend to see this are diehard Stephen King fans and intense movie buffs.
Rating: 1/5
Eliza Casey is a second-year majoring in telecommunications. To contact her, email egc5236@psu.edu.
