Sunday, November 10, 2019

Review: Doll Factory


Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2019
Images from the Internet


Doll Factory
Directed by Stephen Wolfe
Fan Fiction Cinema / Wild Eye Releasing / MVD Entertainment
90 minutes, 2014 / 2019

The way I see it, in a gross generalization kind of way, there are three types of dolls movies. The first – and one of the oldest – is where a lap dummy has a life of its own, usually in the mind of the ventriloquist (but not always). The second is where the doll is haunted, as seen in the Annabelle franchise. Then there is the third where the doll either comes to life, such as with the old “Talking Tina” episode of “The Twilight Zone” (“Living Doll”; 1963), the Zanti Warrior episode of Trilogy of Terror (1975), Stuart Gordon’s Dolls (1987), and the Puppetmaster series (starting in 1987). This comedy falls into the latter category.

After a prologue of previous events, as is typical of these kinds of things, we meet a group of friends at a Halloween party in modern times. Nearly everyone – well, especially the men – are real dicks (pun both intended and not intended), just screaming of male toxicity. This is displayed in macho posturing, not listening to advice (or anything else) especially from women, hyper-sexualizing everything, bullying, etc. Some characters, all I could think was “boy, I hope you die by the end.”

Nicole Elliott, Andy Palmer, Justin Herman
The lead couple are Kay (hyper-cute Nicole Elliott) and her boyfriend/scuzbucket Mark (Justin Herman). Along with two other couples, Allison (Tracy Collins) and Miguel (Milo Rubi), and Erika (Jade Warren) and horndog Blake (Will Allday), plus Derek (Eric Schneider), the third wheel (why is it that there is always one odd guy or gal in these groups? Oh, well, more fodder for the splatter, I guess) they decide to ditch the shindig after Ian (Nasir Villanueva), Kay’s equally macho moroon ex-, and his hostile crew shows up and gets into a fight with Mark.

They head out to the old doll factory and perform some ritual from a book, which raises the cracked baby dolls into a murderous and gore-hungry group (to our delight, of course). Soon the rubber reprobates are roaming the town seeking victims/souls for their “master” (a hysterical turn by Patrick Sane); Kay and Mark rustle up Kay’s nerdy gamer bro Melvin (Andy Palmer) to help fight them off. Also joining the good guys is the redneck sheriff (Chris Fender) and an older African-American grump, Darius (Boo Gay, who steals all his scenes), who were introduced in the 1976 prologue.

SFX
Like the first Scary Movie (2000), this film borders on the ridiculous, but that is also a large part of its charm. Let me put it this way: remember when Popeye would mumble and then one day you paid attention and realized what he was saying was hysterical? Similarly, the dolls are straight-up Freddy Kruger wiseacres, and what they are speaking through their high pitched and silly voices is pretty funny, even if you have to listen to it very carefully. The dolls themselves obviously move via strings, and I’m not sure exactly how many there are in the story compared to how many were made (I’m guessing by the sheer number of them, their number were digitally enhanced). There is a fine mix of digital and practical SFX, and it actually all works well; some of the effects look damn good, and others a little goofy.

Of course, you know there’s going to be a showdown between our intrepid group of five who are to stand up to the legion of devil dolls, and the Master (I write this before I know for certain, as I’m about two-thirds through the film at this point).

Other than the men being complete assholes and most of the women not that smart, the writing is actually quite intelligent in its goofiness, if you’re willing to dig a bit and pay attention between the beer and chips you’re probably eating while watching this, because that is the correct fare for this kind of film. It’s definitely one that you’ll be laughing and talking about while it’s on, but I caution you to perhaps back up once in a while and listen to the dialogue. Man, I wish there were subtitles, which would have made it a lot easier to make out what the dolls were chattering about.

There are certain scenes that I definitely laughed out loud, such as one of the dolls partying with a couple of stoners (reminiscent of the similar pseudo-Ghostface scene in Scary Movie), or the re-introduction of Darius, who is wearing a stuck-on Santa beard and wig.

The first extra is a “Making of Documentary” (29 min.), which is a mix of interviews with the crew and some cast, and describes the beginning of the concept on through. It’s varied with lots of behind the scenes footage that are enjoyable. Next is the “Gag Reel” (7 min.), and like most of these things, there are some funny flubs. Then there is the “Concept Trailer” (2 min.) which is basically an exercise in both practicing for the shoot and a way to get some funding. It’s certainly a bit rough as far as concept goes with different actors, but still amusing to compare with the feature to see how far they came. There are also a few Wild Eye Releasing trailers.

For the full length commentary, it’s the director, Palmer (who is also an executive producer, as well as playing Melvin), and Herman (who portrays the male lead of Mark). Sometimes it is a bit hard to tell who is saying what, but that’s okay. The conversation is a bit stilted, and rarely deep. If you play this you won’t necessarily be wasting your time, but if you skipped it, I don’t believe you’ll miss a whole lot.

The only real regret I have, as I said before, is that there were no captions, so it was easy to miss some of the doll dialogue; when listening to a commentary track, it certainly makes it easier to follow along. But that’s a piffle in the scheme of things.

My fear is that a lot of people are just going to see this as a goofy excuse of a comedy, but, again, I think it’s worth paying attention to what’s happening. It’s not just a silly film about killer baby dolls, but rather a comedy that is quite funny, even if its (mostly male) characters are a bit annoying. I’m hoping there will be a sequel in there somewhere at some time, as is somewhat hinted in a classic trope way.



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