Annabelle: Creation (2017)

Annabelle: Creation

Starring: Lulu Wilson, Talitha Bateman, Miranda Otto, Anthony LaPaglia

Director: David F. Sandberg

IMDB rate: 6,6

My rate: 7

Long time no see! Will I have been gone from this blog, I certainly did not give up on watching horror movies. Does this mean I am back? I have no clue really, we'll see about that I guess :). This review will be about the prequel of Annabelle (which is the prequel of The Conjuring), this being titled Annabelle: Creation. I did not like the first movie that much. It had a lot to offer but the execution of it was rather meh. The sequel actually was surprisingly good compared to it. Here's why....

I felt like Annabelle: Creation had a much more thought out plot compared to the first part. This actually is a prequel to the first movie where you find out about the origins of the evil doll. I however have to admit that the beginning is a bit questionable. Of course the couple where the kids are staying have a secret room no one may enter and of course someone enters it unleashing all evil. It's a bit predictable, eh? I however did like to get to know the story behind the doll. However, I wish we got to see a bit more of the time in between the accident of little Bree and the moment the orphans enter this house. I felt this was rushed too much and it put too much focus on the "now", meaning it still doesn't describe the origins of Annabelle completely. 

I was quite impressed with the acting in this movie. Lulu Wilson (Linda) and Talitha Bateman (Janice) make two excellent friends. Lulu Wilson, also known for her role in Ouija: Origins of Evil, does a great job as young Linda. Mind you, all the viewers fate has to be put in this little girl to save her best friend Janice. I mostly was impressed with Talitha Bateman though. While her character was written very smartly already, she adds even more into the little Janice, who you can't help feel sorry for even though she strictly asks for no compassion because of her injury. They both add a great deal of character to this film.

What I liked most about Annabelle: Creation is the fact that it doesn't rely heavily on the jumpscares. Now the first Annabelle movies definitely tries to creep people out by putting in dumb loud noises and sudden things appearing in the screen. But this mostly just means you got scared of the sound, not of what is happening in the actual movie. And it solely means you are scared to get scared of another sound once again. In my opinion it is much better if a movie tries to make you sit on the edge of your seat because there is so much tension going on. This is exactly what Annabelle: Creation does. Overall, I would definitely recommend giving this movie a chance, even (or especially!) when you did not like the first Annabelle movie. 

Child's Play 2 (1990)

Child's Play 2

IMDb rate: 5,7

Genre: Slasher, Dolls

Starring: Alex Vincent, Brad Dourif, Christine Elise

If I have to name my favorite slasher franchise I would never go for A Nightmare on Elm Street, Halloween or Friday the 13th. Nope, my favorite is and will always be the Child's Play franchise. These movies are so damn enjoyable, there's humor, murder, dolls and there's even somewhat of logic in the sequels. I'll have to admit, I haven't seen the third one yet, but I own it on DVD so I'll give it a watch quite soon. For now, here's my review of Child's Play 2. 

Here is what Child's Play 2 is about:
Andy Barclay has been placed in a foster home after the tragic events of the first film, since his mother was committed. In an attempt to save their reputation, the manufacturers of Chucky reconstruct the killer doll, to prove to the public that nothing was wrong with it in the first place. In doing so, they also bring the soul of serial killer Charles Lee Ray back to life. As Chucky tries to locate Andy, the body count rises. Will Andy be able to escape, or will Chucky succeed in possessing his body?

In the first Child's Play movie there was still a bit of a question if Chucky was actually alive or if it was just Andy's imagination. That lead to mysterious scenes where we didn't actually saw the doll do anything because we watched it from Chucky's (or Andy's?!) view. It was interesting but still it lacked some action scenes of the moving doll. Now we figured out that Chucky is very real we finally get some Chucky action scenes. He is getting a lot more screen time and his character has much more time to shine through. This leads to very funny scenes of where Chucky murders another Good Guy doll, buries it and takes it places. When activated to talk he says "Hi! I'm.... Tommy!", which was pretty funny. Because Chucky gets more screen-time it was needed to update his animations, which worked out pretty well I think. He became a lot more scary than he already was, and to be honest, he got me frightened.

What bothers me in most slasher sequels is the fact that when they died, got beheaded, shot in the heart, set on fire or whatever they show up unharmed in every sequel. Without explanation they just appear fit and alive again. After seeing Child's Play I was already wondering how they would going to explain the return of Chucky in Child's Play 2, since he was set on fire and there wasn't much left of him. They actually played it very clever because the makers of the dolls were rebuilding Chucky to check if something was wrong with him, with as main idea to not be sued for any mistakes. It's simple, but so clever. That's also what I like about Bride of Chucky, because he actually looks fucked up there which is pretty logical after all that shit that happened to him. It's also what I enjoy about Curse of Chucky, at first he looks perfect again, which is very questionable after Bride of Chucky and Seed of Chucky. But then it appears that his perfect looking skin is just make-up and he is still scarred underneath it. I honestly thought it was brilliant and I loved it immensely (also the return of Alex Vincent and Jennifer Tilly, it was fucking awesome).

As before, Andy ends up being in some messed up situations again. Being blamed for everything, and not being believed by anyone. I did feel sorry for poor Andy, he just can't seem to catch a break. But for real, when you take a foster kid in home that's being traumatized by a doll, why the hell would you keep that same looking doll lying around in your house?! Great acting again from Alex Vincent, very convincing little kid. Wasn't specifically crazy about Christine Elise as Kyle though, but her character wasn't very much important anyway. The best thing about Chucky is of course Brad Dourif's voice, Chucky is just unthinkable with that voice. I'm really glad that he's still doing it, because Chucky without Brad Dourif is just not Chucky. A bit like Freddy Krueger without Robert Englund, it's just not really Freddy Krueger (I'm looking at you, A Nightmare on Elm Street remake).

The first Child's Play wasn't necessarily a slasher, with the sequel though, the whole image changed. The body count of Child's Play 2 doubled, the kills became more gruesome and innovative and Chucky doesn't really seem to care anymore who he kills to get to Andy. This did lead to a few awesome/gruesome looking kills though, for example when a technician encounters the eyeball machine of the toy-factory...

Child's Play 2 is a worthy sequel, it follows up perfectly with the first movie and it evolves the character Chucky to a real killer doll. Perhaps it's less scary than the previous movie, but the improvement of doll-animations sure boosts the scare-level a lot. The plot is fun and the death scenes are pretty awesome. Definitely a very entertaining movie.

My rate: 7/10

Annabelle (2014)

Annabelle

IMDB rate: 5,5

Genre: Dolls, Ghost
Starring: Annabelle Willis, Ward Horton, Tony Amendola

Annabelle is the prequel for highly anticipated The Conjuring. To be honest, I wasn't a big fan of The Conjuring. I thought it was a reasonable movie, but nothing special although everybody seems to love it. I did look forward to Annabelle though, because the doll from The Conjuring was pretty scary looking and a movie about it would be amazing. I am a big fan of Dead Silence, which also happens to be made by the same director as The Conjuring, the amazing James Wan. Even though Annabelle is a prequel of The Conjuring, it's unfortunately not made by James Wan, and I think that's the biggest reason this movie isn't very good.

John Form has found the perfect gift for his expectant wife, Mia - a beautiful, rare vintage doll in a pure white wedding dress. But Mia's delight with Annabelle doesn't last long. On one horrific night, their home is invaded by members of a satanic cult, who violently attack the couple. Spilled blood and terror are not all they leave behind. The cultists have conjured an entity so malevolent that nothing they did will compare to the sinister conduit to the damned that is now... Annabelle..

I was very excited for Annabelle, the doll is scary looking and I honestly think the horror world lacks good scary doll movies. The Conjuring was a reasonable movie, so I had high hopes for Annabelle as well. But like I already mentioned, it was not directed by James Wan who definitely is the master of puppets in my opinion.

Annabelle was in my opinion a pretty weird movie, the movie had some troubles finding a direction and so it seemed like it just went all kinds of directions. There are scary dolls, ghosts, some sort of solid ghost, demons and weird children, it's a bit too much, and it seems like it all leads to nothing. I admit that it does have some nice scares, but for some reason they were not fitting scares for this movie. The dolls in this movie were pretty scary, but unfortunately they were hardly used. In a movie like this, when the camera focuses very long on a lifeless object you just expect that something will happen, the head will move or the doll will blink or something like that. And nothing similar to that every happens, biggest disappointment ever. Sure, it's not the most original stuff that could happen in a doll movie, but it's almost necessary to make the doll really seem scary. The doll floats once, absolutely not scary at all.

The acting was decent I think, Annabelle Willis (hah!) plays new mother Mia and she does a decent job playing the scared housewife. I had more respect though for Eddie Redmayne look-a-like Ward Horton who plays her husband John Gordon, he was pretty awesome I think. The one I appreciated the most in this movie was the baby though, not for her acting skills, but for her incredible adorableness :).

Annabelle is not a very original movie and not the fun prequel of The Conjuring that I was expecting. It's lacking an interesting story and the doll is just not made scary unfortunately. I think it could've been more interesting if made by James Wan which would've been the more logical director compared to John R. Leonetti. It's a very predictable movie, nothing special ever happens. Sure, it's made nice and there are some cool jumpscares but overall it's a very unimaginative movie which resembles Insidious a bit too much unfortunately.

My rate: 5/10

Review: Dead Silence (2007)

Dead Silence

IMDB rate: 6,0

Genre: Ghost

I remember when I first saw the trailer of this movie in 2006, I was maybe 14 years old and I could not be more excited for this movie. The first time I saw it I almost pissed my pants because it was so damn scary. I believe I watched it with some friends and I really liked the movie. Personally, I'm terrified of dolls, so this movie was the ultimate scare-source for me. I really think there are too little killer doll movies, or clowns whatsoever. Useless information but I remember that after the first time I watched it my friends put a doll on my bed when I went to the toilet, so as you can imagine, I screamed my lungs out (my tongue would have been eaten by Mary Shaw if she was real).

Every town has it's own ghost story, and a local folktale around Ravens Fair is about a ventriloquist named Mary Shaw. After she went mad in the 1940s, she was accused of kidnapping a young boy who yelled out in one of her performances that she was a fraud. Because of this she was hunted down by townspeople who in the ultimate act of revenge, cut out her tongue and then killed her. They buried her along with her "children", a handmade collection of vaudeville dolls, and assumed they had silenced her forever. However, Ravens Fair has been plagued by mysterious deaths around them after Mary Shaws collection has returned from their graves and have come to seek revenge on people that killed her and their families. Far from the pall of their cursed hometown, newlyweds Jamie and Lisa Ashen thought they had established a fresh start, until Jamie's wife is grotesquely killed in their apartment. Jamie returns to Ravens Fair for the funeral, intent on unraveling the mystery of Lisa's death.

I know that many people dislike Dead Silence but I really like the movie. It contains dolls, is scary, good acting, impressive music and an interesting story. In most of these movies there's always something wrong, or terrible acting or it's absolutely not scary. Or whatever else. What I mean is, I don't think there's anything wrong with this movie, but I must admit since I've seen this movie a thousand times already, that it's not that fascinating anymore. It's still a good movie though.

The acting is amazing. I'm not very familiar with Ryan Kwanten but I think he was excellent. Also Amber Valetta and Bob Gunton were both amazing. Donnie Wahlberg was good too but I think someone else would have fitted the role better. 

I like the way the movie is made, it's a very dark movie where almost everything is in black and white and the only noticeable color is red. It gives a very cool effect on the movie. 

The buildings chosen for the movie are very beautiful. Especially the abandoned lake house looks amazing, it's sad that it's not a real house. 

The dolls are scary as hell, especially the clown doll. It's the ultimate scary combination: dolls and clowns. Also, the doll Billy from the Saw movies makes a small appearance too. 

Brilliant movie, really recommendable. I think it's the ultimate scary doll movie besides the Child's Play movies. Great movie that's quite scary when watching it the first time.

My personal rate: 9/10

Review: Child's Play (1988)

Child's Play

IMDB rate: 6,4

Genre: Slasher

Last weekend I watched Child's Play. Unfortunately I can't watch Child's Play 2 and Child's Play 3 because they are very expensive to buy, so I'll have to wait until I find them cheap somewhere.

I'm really afraid for dolls, so as you can imagine I'm a big Chucky fan! This movie is fairly old and even thought there is not much movement in Chucky in the beginning, when he finally starts walking and killing it looks very real! I thought that it would look very fake but I was quite impressed by it.

When Charles Lee Ray needs to get quick escape from cop Mike Norris, he takes his soul and buries it into playful, seemingly good guy doll Chucky. Little does he know a little boy by the name of Andy Barclay will be the new owner of him soon-to-come. Charles confides in Andy while he commits numerous murders. Once the adults accept Andy's story as truth, it's too late.

As I already said, Chucky looks real good in this movie. Of course you notice that it's an older movie but I think it's excellent for that period. You see a lifeless Chucky for the first half of the movie and parts where he is walking is seen from his own eyes, at first I was very disappointed because I would love to actually see him walk. Luckily, I just needed to be patient. The second half of the movie was absolutely not disappointing because not only did Chucky walk, he became the fearless murderer he is known for!

I must admit that I also enjoy watching the comedic versions of Chucky, a.k.a. Bride of Chucky and Seed of Chucky. I just like how he looks in those movies and I think the comedic twist fits Chucky quite a bit. But, of course this is Child's Play, the serious Chucky version. I like how he looks in this movie, it's completely different than BOC or SOC but still very scary.

The acting in the movie is quite good, especially the very young Alexander Vincent plays remarkably well. He's adorable and very smart, it's impossible to not love this kid. And of course, there is Brad Dourif's voice as Chucky. If you ask me, I think it's the perfect voice for the scary doll.
The story is quite original in this movie. Even though the ending was a bit predictable, it was not a movie filled with cliches.

Many people say that they shouldn't have made Child's Play into a horror movie, but into a thriller. Meaning that Andy would appear to be the killer the whole time. I have to disagree with them because I think it's brilliant to use a simple doll as a murderer. Sure the story how he became the murderer might be a bit weak, but bringing a doll to life is one of the best moves in horror history. I never find a movie scary, unless there is a killer doll or killer clown in it. I can imagine that many kids watching the movie back then became a bit scared for their dolls as well.

I did see Child's Play a few times before but I've never seen the second and third Child's Play. I'll have to wait a bit longer before I'm able to watch those but I'm quite excited to see them eventually.

If you like a good suspenseful slasher movie then Child's Play is definitely recommended. It's not like the usual slasher cliche and brings in an unusual killer. I know that I liked it a lot!

My personal rate: 7,5/10