How Italian Horror And Christian Camps Inspired ‘Black Phone 2’

(From left) Finn (Mason Thames) and The Grabber (Ethan Hawke) in ‘Black Telephone 2.’

Common Studios

“I did not really feel obliged to make a sequel in any respect,” explains director Scott Derrickson as we focus on supernatural slasher sequel Black Telephone 2. “Jeff Shell, who was the chairman of Common when the primary film got here out, emailed me the Monday after the opening weekend and stated, ‘You are going to make a sequel, proper?’ They needed a sequel instantly, primarily based on simply the primary opening weekend.”

Critics and audiences liked The Black Phone, which went on to gross $161.4 million worldwide on a funds of lower than $20 million. Nonetheless, the filmmaker, who has additionally given audiences Physician Unusual, Sinister, and The Exorcism of Emily Rose, needed to take his time.

“I didn’t have any actual ideas about it till Joe Hill, who got here up with the unique thought, emailed me some ideas that he had. His fundamental premise was that The Grabber calls Finney, his sufferer who escapes within the first movie, from Hell. I used to be like, ‘Properly, that sounds sort of cool and apparent, as a result of the primary film was filled with lifeless people who find themselves calling Finney already.’ I did not really feel prefer it was that a lot of a stretch when it got here to the logic of the universe and the primary film.”

Right here’s What Influenced ‘Black Telephone 2’

Set 4 years after The Black Telephone, Black Telephone 2 sees Finney, performed as soon as once more by Methods to Prepare Your Dragon’s Mason Thames, combating life after his captivity by the hands of The Grabber, whom he killed earlier than escaping. When his sister begins receiving unsettling calls in her goals from the black telephone and sees disturbing visions of three boys being stalked at Alpine Lake, a winter camp, they resolve to research what is going on, why, and the way. Ethan Hawke returns because the now iconic boogieman, The Grabber. Black Telephone 2 is R-rated and lands in theaters on Friday, October 17, 2025.

“I believe the primary film can be a supernatural thriller, and the concept of then making an actual highschool horror movie this time was attention-grabbing,” Derrickson, who additionally co-wrote the script, says as we chat over Zoom. “I went to those Christian winter camps after I was an adolescent, they usually’re very visible, visceral, and emotionally efficient locations. With all these mixed, and after I acquired the allure of the story going, is the purpose at which I stated to Common and Blumhouse that I had an thought for a sequel I would love to do. They simply stated, ‘Do it.’ They paid me to jot down the script and greenlit it as quickly as they learn it.”

Black Telephone 2 is stylistically even bolder than the primary, actually leaning into the movies and codecs of the interval. Whereas many individuals may draw a comparability with the A Nightmare on Elm Road films, particularly Dream Warriors, his love of Italian horror was additionally massively instrumental, subconsciously.

“Suspiria is my favourite horror movie and I like Dario Argento, Lucio Fulci, and the entire subgenre of giallo movies,” Derrickson enthuses. “That was a giant affect in making an attempt to take a excessive, daring, creative strategy to the visible design of the film. That is one thing Italians have all the time completed, which you do not see completed quite a bit in American horror cinema. You see it typically, nevertheless it’s not the norm. I wasn’t serious about it immediately and saying, ‘I need to pull this facet of this explicit movie.’ Nonetheless, it is extra the visible excessive artwork sensibility of it, and the self-discipline that it takes to create a visible tapestry. My curiosity in doing that as a filmmaker generally comes purely from Argento.”

“Even A Nightmare on Elm Road wasn’t a lot an affect, however I discovered myself writing the story, and simply discovering we have been in A Nightmare on Elm Road territory. It was much less about aware influences and extra about realizing that this can be a film set in 1982, which led me to resolve to shoot a whole lot of it on outdated movie inventory and Tremendous 8. I felt actually good about that. That was the period of all of the camp slasher films that adopted Friday the thirteenth. The Shining got here out in 1980, however there was a blizzard. I discovered that compelling as a result of we’re having an ongoing dialog with these films, which in all probability led me to take that shot from the 1983 movie Curtains and pay a really unabashed homage to that film with the picture of The Grabber on the ice. All of this additionally made me understand that I too wanted to create one thing that’s attention-grabbing.”

How Scott Derrickson Finds Magnificence In Horror

Due to the movie’s visible texture and the breadth of basic cinema, each worldwide and home, Black Telephone 2 is more likely to encourage potential cinephiles to take a look at the flicks that had an affect on Derrickson and this work.

“And that is great,” he says. “Each filmmaker is drawing on different filmmakers. All of us stand on the shoulders of giants, in some regard. That is the character of the stream of worldwide cinema, which is one thing I spent a whole lot of my younger grownup life actually finding out. I examined how completely different actions emerged, giving strategy to new ones, and the way administrators transitioned. I believe a very thrilling a part of the artwork kind is to have the ability to bounce into that lineage and swim upstream to see the place issues have come from.”

“Black Telephone 2 going again extra to that Italian sensibility is as a result of these are the movies that made me need to be a horror filmmaker. After I was in movie college and I noticed Suspiria for the primary time, I used to be like, ‘Oh, my God, you are able to do this? This can be a slasher film, and it is essentially the most lovely factor I’ve ever seen.’ The rating, the ambiance, the ethereal tone, particularly the primary 20 minutes of that film, is so mind-bogglingly chic that I believe that it made me understand there are a lot greater ambitions that you may have as a horror director than I believe a whole lot of horror administrators actually enable themselves to have.”

When it got here to guardrails and parameters for the expanded universe of Black Telephone 2, the director, who co-wrote and co-produced the film with C. Robert Cargill, has learnt that it’s higher to create and observe his personal guidelines moderately than be certain by conventional style tropes.

“You need to use good sense about what the viewers goes to need to know and never know and belief your personal intuition,” he explains. “Anyone can convey the hammer of logic to a supernatural movie, particularly a ghost story, convey that down and break it aside and say, ‘This doesn’t make sense. This does not maintain up. If they may do this, why did not they do that?’ Each ghost story that I’ve seen, that’s good, has some sense of the frustration of the ghost limitations that adjust all through the film.”

“My feeling is that we did not bend or break the foundations of the primary film with Black Telephone 2. The principles have been established within the first film, and we elaborated on them. My angle when watching a supernatural film is that the foundations are what I see, as a result of there is no such thing as a actuality I can grasp with Aristotelian logic to find out how issues are. Some issues could not make a whole lot of sense, however that is what’s taking place within the film as a result of that is the universe I am in. I’ve to simply accept that. That is a way more thrilling and trustworthy strategy to watch supernatural cinema than making an attempt to spend your time pinning down the inflexible guidelines throughout the universe of that realm.”

With anticipation excessive for Black Telephone 2, horror persevering with to be on a roll on the field workplace, and Halloween falling lower than two weeks after the movie’s theatrical launch, it seems set to repeat the success of its predecessor. So, ought to the decision come from Common for one more movie, what are Derrickson’s ideas?

“I haven’t got any ideas about that a technique or one other,” he confesses. “I believe it’s important to strategy every film by itself and never fear about that. For those who’re serious about a future franchise, you are going to find yourself creatively restrictive within the film. I made Physician Unusual, however I used to be lucky that it was a film with no ties to the MCU. It was a standalone film. I wasn’t restricted by any of that, and it was great. On this case, I made the primary film with no ideas of a sequel. I ended up making a sequel, however I nonetheless don’t have any ideas of a prequel or sequel. Does that imply I will not make one? No, however I simply completed Black Telephone 2, and it was necessary to me to complete it with none of that in thoughts.”