Dolly Dearest Year: 1992 Director: Maria Lease Written by: Maria Lease Threat: Possessed Doll Weapon of Choice: Dynamite Based upon: none IMDb page:

Other movies in this series:
None

Rish's Reviews
For at least a decade, I've seen this flick on the shelves. I've always had something better to do. Till now.
An entrepenureal father uproots his family to Mexico, where he's invested all their savings into a doll-making enterprise. The warehouse happens to be located right next to a buried Mayan ruin of some sort, and when the spirit of the son of the devil is unleashed, it takes possession of a particularly ugly doll, which of course is given to the little daughter of the family. The doll is evil, people attempt to warn the family, the doll comes to life when nobody else is around, the little girl starts turning evil herself, basically the same domestic story we've all experienced, one time or another.
Blah. I don't have a lot to say about this one. I've found that my longest reviews are for movies I love, and the second-longest reviews are for the movies I really hate. That I can barely muster enough for four paragraphs tells you that this one fell in that wasteland in between.
Rip Torn plays a pseudo-Mexican historian/archeologist/scientist/graverobber/professor . . . or something. Denise Crosby, who plays the mom, is pretty good. Was Crosby EVER a celebrity, Former or otherwise? A kid I remember seeing from Star Trek, Chris Demetral, plays the son. He's basically one of those too-smart-for-his-own-good child characters that anyone who's not a kid despises. Realising that a character like that is not cool is truly one of the milestones of every adolescent.
Dolls are weird. I said in my Child's Play reviews that dolls aren't scary. But they are. I guess it's the fact that they're representations of people, only smaller, and that they're intended to be as realistic as possible, with brushable hair and eyes that open and close. But they're never quite right. They never look exactly like real, live people. And when they do, well, they're even scarier for the deadness of their eyes.
Unfortunately, once the doll starts to talk and run around, it's completely ludicrous, much like Chucky. It's only when the doll just sits there, and is supposed to be cute, that it's scary.
The only other thing I can think of to comment on is the shrieking, overzealous Mexican housekeeper, who rants on and on about el muñeco diabolico and our good pal Satanás. Having seen a religious horror flick or two, it strikes me as odd how the American/Anglo main characters so universally dismiss the religious Hispanics (or Italians) as if they are loin-clothed natives shaking their spears at the sound of thunder. That we don't resent their doing so seems rather unusual. Of course, it's strange that it's always the fat, shaking Mexican woman in this part, proclaiming in monosyllabic spurts that the powers of darkness are on the rise and a tremor in the Catholic Force is making her feel bad. It's racist, sure, but it never seems to bother anybody.
The film started out alright and it never really fell apart or became crap, but it was pretty bland, pretty mediocre. The filmmakers built up the evil throughout the film, hoping that we would be afraid of the inevitable attack. When it came, however, the damn doll was so easy to dispatch, that I was SURE it would pop up again, perhaps even winning the day. But no. Basically, the kids could've taken it out.
They pulled off a really impressively frightening little girl in young actress Candace Hutson. She snarls, plots, threatens, and reverts quickly to sweet Aryan daughter when it suits her purposes. Good work on that. But this ends up working against the film, because the little girl went from murderous to adorable so fast I was sure she would turn out to be shamming. Like the too-easily-defeated doll, that sets up in the viewers minds an expectation--a certain undropped shoe, if you will--and we wait impatiently for the release to come.
I'm still waiting.
Line To Remember: "Play with THIS, bitch!"
I'd Recommend It To: Huge fans of evil doll pictures.
Posted: April 19, 2005

Total Skulls: 12

Sequel
Sequel setup
Rips off earlier film
Horror film showing on TV/in theater in movie
Future celebrity appears
Former celebrity appears
Bad title
Bad premise
Bad acting
Bad dialogue
Bad execution
MTV Editing
OTS
Girl unnecessarily gets naked
Wanton sex
Death associated with sex
Unfulfilled promise of nudity
Characters forget about threat
Secluded location
Power is cut
Phone lines are cut
Someone investigates a strange noise
Someone runs up stairs instead of going out front door
Camera is the killer
Victims cower in front of a window/door
Victim locks self in with killer
Victim running from killer inexplicably falls
Toilet stall scene
Shower/bath scene
Car stalls or won't start
Cat jumps out
Fake scare
Laughable scare
Stupid discovery of corpse
Dream sequence
Hallucination/Vision
No one believes only witness
Crazy, drunk, old man knows the truth
Warning goes unheeded
Music detracts from scene
Death in first five minutes
x years before/later
Flashback sequence
Dark and stormy night
Killer doesn't stay dead
Killer wears a mask
Killer is in closet
Killer is in car with victim
Villain is more sympathetic than heroes
Unscary villain/monster
Beheading
Blood fountain
Blood spatters - camera, wall, etc.
Poor death effect
Excessive gore
No one dies at all
Virgin survives
Geek/Nerd survives
Little kid lamely survives
Dog/Pet miraculously survives
Unresolved subplots
"It was all a dream" ending
Unbelievably happy ending
Unbelievably crappy ending
What the hell?