Quartile rating: 4.5/10 · 1 rating
When a strange signal pulsates through all cell phone networks worldwide, it starts a murderous epidemic of epic proportions when users become bloodthirsty creatures, and a group of people in New England are among the survivors to deal with the ensuing chaos after.
Cell (2016) is a disappointing adaptation of Stephen King's novel that squanders its intriguing premise. The plot starts with a genuinely tense airport sequence but quickly devolves into a meandering, logic-defying survival story with poor pacing. The acting from John Cusack and Samuel L. Jackson feels phoned-in and lacks the chemistry needed to carry the film. Cinematography is functional at best, with nothing visually distinctive to elevate the material. As a zombie/infected subgenre entry it offers little novelty beyond its cell phone twist, which is itself borrowed from the source novel. The ending is perhaps its greatest failing — notoriously incoherent, it leaves audiences baffled rather than satisfied or thoughtfully ambiguous, representing one of the more frustrating conclusions in recent horror cinema.