Phone

Phone

Phone, the 2002 South Korean import, (which with its presumptive anti-cell-phone message is designed to make luddites at the Sewer very happy) manages to meld Asian-style scares and Hollywood-style feeling for a not-altogether bad scary movie.

It has a rambling, shambling story-line that works hard Hollywood-style to explain what's going on - even if it takes way too much effort to get there. Sadly, the strain involved in figuring things out eventually subtracts from what Sewer-seekers love best, creepy long-haired Asian gals lurkin' around.

In a semi-Ring-inspired conceit, Ji-won gets a cell-phone number with a bad ring-tone, that is, most of the time her caller is a vengeful ghost. She soon learns that previous users of that number have died mysterious deaths, and so as not to be driven mad by beyond-the-grave overage charges, she sets out to figure out what's up.

This involves plenty of detective work punctuated by now-rote fleeting glimpses of Wednesday Addams Asian-style, that is; an uncanny slumping gal with lots of black hair. Depending on your outlook, these sudden appearances are either real shockers or eventually yawn-inducing, since mostly they involve sudden flashes and jolts of music, a tactic that substitutes reflex-action for scares.

Early scenes of true terror feature the potentially milk-curdling face of girl-child Yeong-ju, a face that only a blind mother could love. Speaking of possession, Yeong-ju is up for the task, progressing from seeing weird faces hidden in among her dollies to full-on vengeful-spirit controlled tantrums.

But it's a case of too much. Too many musical cues for scares, too many clues and tidbits, and too many dizzying time shifts used to explain things. Bring back the days of some creaky-jointed dame creeping out of a closet real-slow, that's what the Sewer thinks makes a great Asian horror movie.

Phone is no disappointment, but viewers inured to the wiles of the horror world will begin calling the shots and looking at their watches long before it's over.