'88 Minutes': One heck of an obscene phone call

April 18, 2008— -- Just so you know upfront: Several cellphones appear to have been injured in the making of "88 Minutes."

An inane thriller whose major fear factor hinges on a menacing phone call, the film also relies on a silly phrase intended to fill the viewer with unspeakable terror: "Tick tock, Doc."

Bugs Bunny might as well have delivered the line for all the fear it strikes.

This may be the most preposterous movie of the year. It is certainly the most ridiculous movie starring an Oscar-winning actor.

Al Pacino plays a forensic psychologist whose fame seems to rival that of Paris Hilton. Everybody -- and we mean everybody -- knows of him. And not everybody is impressed. Especially that creepy caller who gives him the hour and 28 minutes to live.

Pacino, as the rich and famous Jack Gramm, is a hard-drinking womanizer, emotionally scarred by the murder of his kid sister. His damning testimony enrages a particularly heinous serial murderer named Jon Forster (Neal McDonough), who blames his conviction and impending execution solely on Gramm's testimony. It's interesting that the killer has no wrath for the prosecutor, arresting officers or jury but is determined to wreak revenge on a psychologist.

But that's the least of the film's implausibilities. In one scene, Gramm's silver Porsche is vandalized, its windows shattered. In the next scene, the car is speeding through the streets, miraculously restored to its former pristine condition. And then there's a shifty-looking guy in a leather jacket who keeps appearing throughout the movie. Gramm asks, "Who is that guy?" But he doesn't follow up.

Did we mention that Gramm also is a psychology professor with a class full of students who engage in extracurricular crime-solving sprees of their own? These are dedicated pupils. The threatening message occurs during one of Gramm's college lectures, which is interrupted several times by ominous phone calls. Perhaps classrooms are another place where cellphones ought to be banned.

Which brings us to the long list of laughable lines, delivered with the utmost seriousness. When Gramm tells a police associate (William Forsythe) that he has received calls threatening his life, the detective responds with widened eyes: "Jesus, Jack, why '88 minutes?'" Could it be because that's the title of the movie?

Rather than being a tense psychological thriller, it's a movie strewn with plot holes and contrivances. A slew of red herrings serve to temporarily distract, rather than intrigue or even confuse. The lines are so derivative that when Pacino's character gets worked up, you almost expect him to yell: "I'm out of order? You're out of order!"

The best thing that can be said about "88 Minutes" is that it is sometimes unintentionally hilarious. But when all is added up, there might be eight minutes of laughs at the absurd situations and idiotic dialogue. That leaves a lot of time to sit in the theater and check your watch. Or your cellphone.