When White Noise begins, a title indicates that Thomas Edison suggested in 1928 that the dead might communicate with the living by means of radio waves. A second title notes that such communications, known as the electronic voice phenomenon (EVP), have been observed from 1939 and that the phenomenon is increasingly being studied seriously. At the end, a title reveals that among thousands of EVP messages that have been documented, one out of twelve is threatening. The story is then based on a possible series of encounters involving one Jonathan Rivers (played by Michael Keaton), an architect in Vancouver, Canada. Soon after the film begins, Rivers's wife Anna (played by Chandra West), a successful author, dies under mysterious circumstances. Next, he is stalked by a strange man, Raymond Price (played by Ian McNeice), who informs him that he is receiving EVP messages from Anna. At first skeptical, Rivers begins to believe Price after experiencing three unusual events. He then visits Price, meets Sarah Tate (played by Deborah Kara Unger), a bookstore owner also affected by EVP, utilizes advanced technology at home to receive EVP communications, and listens in obsessively, hoping to communicate with his dead wife. However, the incoming EVP messages prompt him to become a crusader, despite advice from a psychic about the dangers; he acts on messages about impending deaths to try to save those whom EVP messages predict will die if he does not act as their savior, thereby angering three evil ghosts who appear on his monitor screen. The film, directed by Geoffrey Sax, then quickly degenerates into a detective/horror film. MH
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