On D List of Movie Reviews
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Dolls (1986)
Rate:
7
Viewed:
1/25
1/25:
Believe it or not, I had been meaning to see Dolls for decades but never did until now because of my
hate for Child's Play.
The wait has been well worth it. If not for Carrie Lorraine and Stephen Lee as Judy and Ralph, respectively,
the film won't have worked out. It has its moments and is quite short in running length at 77 minutes.
The lightning effect is put to good use at the right moments on top of the haunted house that seems to be
straight out of Burnt Offerings. By the way, the old man's wife is
played by Hilary Mason, and she was the blind psychic in Don't Look Now.
Sure, there are weak parts here and there due to the somewhat low budget of $2 million, but the movie is not bad
for the most part. As for the characters, it's simple to tell from the get-go who'll live and who'll die. I like how Judy
played it safe at the end about being free of all dolls and her own teddy bear before leaving the mansion
as to say, "Hey, thanks, but...no thanks."
Having taken a year to complete, the stop motion animation work with the dolls is impressive, especially
when the soldiers lined up to fire at one of the Madonna wannabe hitchhikers. How these dolls came to life
makes sense as they are the people who had once visited the mansion and were either killed or transformed,
hence the ugly-looking entities inside them.
Back to Carrie Lorraine and Stephen Lee, I wondered what happened to them afterwards. The former never did
another film which is a surprise; she was the least annoying child actor I could recall in a long time. But
the latter died of a heart attack in 2014 at age 58. He actually had a role in
Seinfeld as the indecisive carpenter who installed new cabinets in Jerry's
apartment in an episode entitled "The Nap" during Season Eight.
All in all, forget Child's Play; Dolls is the one to see.