Wireless portal to the dead

The technophobic horror flick “Pulse” is a cautionary tale that could have been dreamed up by a frustrated parent: If you don’t get off of that computer, you’ll turn into a zombie.

In “Pulse,” all the little marvels of the modern world -- PCs, PDAs, wireless Internet -- become portals for soul-stealing phantoms who prey on the living. (Attractive college students are a favorite target.) Eventually, the only safe places are the dead zones where cellphone signals can’t reach. This may be the first movie in which the frantic heroes are actually hoping for a dropped call.

The story concerns a psychology major, Mattie (Kristen Bell of the UPN series “Veronica Mars”), whose boyfriend hangs himself after spending too much time staring into his flat-screen monitor. Soon, phantoms are appearing in the real world, emerging from walls and jumping out of washing machines. Meanwhile, a hipster hacker named Dexter (Ian Somerhalder of ABC’s “Lost,” who adds some spice to the otherwise bland cast) discovers that it’s all the fault of a mysterious virus and that the fate of the world may lie in a piece of software hidden in a nifty keychain hard drive. Will Dexter and Mattie be able to plug the device into a central server and stop the madness?

“Pulse” is a remake of a film from Japan, a country where newfangled technology collides with ancient traditions. But there are hints of a deeper meaning in the ponderous voice-over: “What was meant to connect us to one another instead connected us to forces we could not imagine.” That’s a lot of weight to put on this flimsy movie.

From a marketing standpoint, the film’s appeal is clear: If you want to scare teenagers, you gotta hit them where they live. That no longer means summer camps and baby-sitting gigs but online chat rooms and video websites. The movie is full of scenes in which fashionably dressed, tech-savvy students tap away on laptops, send text messages and hang out in front of Web-cams. Jim Sonzero directs the movie like a hard-rock video with all the familiar jump cuts, sudden overexposures and fast-to-slow motion techniques.

The clumsy script comes from Ray Wright and the otherwise imaginative horror veteran Wes Craven. Aside from the dull dialogue (“Save yourselves!”), there are glaring questions that never come close to being answered. Can the phantoms come through land lines? Why can they walk through walls but become frustrated when you make a last-minute dive into an elevator? And if they’re phantoms, why can you punch them in the face?

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‘Pulse’

MPAA rating: PG-13 for intense sequences of sci-fi terror, disturbing images, language, sensuality and thematic material.

A Dimension Films/Weinstein Co. release. Director Jim Sonzero. Screenplay Wes Craven, Ray Wright. Based on the movie “Kairo” written by Kiyoshi Kurosawa. Director of photography Mark Plummer. Editor Robert K. Lambert. Running time: 1 hour, 27 minutes.

In general release.