Spooktober! Review: The Cantankerous Cult of Mr. Chucky.

(This one is a puppet.)

Quick, think of the last time you saw a Chucky film advertised. If you answered that question with anything other than "I see it on all the sites I visit" you're likely part of the group who never even heard about the film I'm about to review. The likelihood that you even saw a single bit of marketing for this film is slim to none, because guess what, it's a direct to DVD movie. You know what that means? Probably, but I'll still explain it. Lower budget, lower budget, and uhh, a lower budget. Now, you probably at least know who Chucky is, because at one point it was unavoidable to see him. He was an icon of horror just like any other from the 80's. Freddy, Jason, Michael, Chucky, these are the faces people recognize instantly, as sort of grandfathers of the genre in a sense. So, you can imagine my excitement when I heard there was yet another film coming out in the Chucky series, a sequel to 2013's fantastic return to roots film Curse of Chucky, which starred the voice of Chucky (Brad Dourif)'s daughter, Fiona. It was in essence a reminiscence of the original film, and a sort of sequel set many many years later that tied that film to a lot of the original child's play mythology. It was excellent, well shot, and well acted given the budget really. It was somewhat of a renaissance for the Chuck, he went back to being horror, not shtick. Sure, it had his clever one liners and witticisms, but we only saw Chucky when he was actively murdering someone. He never talked to people, or broke the mold of being a doll unless intent to kill. Just like old times. Now, fast forward to Cult of Chucky, which appears to be on an even lower budget which I find odd given the success of the last film. What can I say about this movie that isn't a spoiler? I guess not much, so be warned my story review will have some minor spoilers. But the title of the movie is a spoiler itself, so, whatever.

(That one is truly the face of low budget CGI)

Pacing: Slower than a tortoise at times, shifty as hell.

Alright, now, this is something I look at in a lot of horror films. How is the story paced? Is it slow, and does the story make any sense at all? This movie is slow, unfortunately, sometimes painfully slow to get started. I love Chucky, I really do, but the pace at which this movie gets to the point was not very impressive from a critical standpoint. It inches along, introducing all the characters in this psychiatry ward (which, I forgot to mention, is the setting for the film), and even throwing in a completely unnecessary sex scene with Fiona and one of the inpatients, which just feels a little odd and out of place. It's almost as if it was put in to fulfill some sort of Chucky fanservice checklist or something, but a lot of this film feels like a paint by the numbers affair like that. The pacing when it isn't being lethargic goes into ultra speed and completely whisks past some of the more central plot points in the film. The explanation for many of the problems occurring in the asylum is just... ridiculous, and there's barely any time spent on explaining them. This movie feels just as disjointed as another Chucky classic, Seed of Chucky. I've watched that movie several times and still don't fully understand what the hell is going on in it at times, it's just funny. The plot in this film makes many shifts, some are good, some are awful. There's a mess with all of the pacing, it just seems like it was copied and pasted together with bits and pieces of it shattered here and there.

Story: Multiplication problems in real life!

*Major story spoilers below, ye have been warned!*

Here's the meat of the review right here, the story. Dear god, I don't know how to explain this without spoilers so I put that spoiler warning there this time around. Now, I've already established that it takes place in an insane asylum, yes. Fiona Dourif's character is committed after the events of Curse of Chucky because as usual no one believes her that Chucky committed the murders in her home during the course of that film. It's a typical he said she said case and, well, who's gonna believe someone who says a killer doll went on a rampage in their home. Nonetheless, she's being given treatment momentarily at a high security facility, but at the beginning of the film begins her transfer over to a medium security facility. I don't remember the name of the facilities, I'm sorry, but it's not that important. Upon arriving at said facilities, we get to slog through the introduction of all the characters, inpatients at the facility. There's some ghost like lady whose name I forgot, Malcolm, the guy she has sex with and who has a multiple personality disorder, some bitch who dies pretty fast, and a girl who killed her daughter when she was a baby. That's about the depth of each character's story, there is no real character building before hell breaks loose of course, because it's a Chucky movie. So, after we sit through the obligatory introductions, we get to the therapy scene, and what does mr therapist have, you ask? Why, it's a good guy doll of course, because that's worked in every film so far in the series (and he got it from Hot Topic, hahaha). Oh, and if you're asking yourself, where is Andy, because that's the character that was teased most in the movie. At the beginning we see him on a date, which turns sour because she looked up his prior history with Chucky and all the murders. He then goes home and pulls out the severed head of Chucky, does some typical banter with him, and then proceeds to torture him. This is shown right at the beginning and is sort of an aside until much later into the film. Just like this aside I put in here to talk about it. Anyway, the therapy session goes a little south of course, Fiona is not happy about the good guy doll being there but Mr therapist doesn't give a shit. And the girl who killed her baby thinks that the good guy is her baby. Yep, fast times at Medium Security High here. Mega bitch tries to deny her that fact, but she doesn't care, and then in the next scene mega bitch and Fiona get into a fight. Honestly, at this point in the movie I just wanted Chucky to come to life and murder them all then and there to save me from their insufferable acting. After all this nonsense and gobbledy gook, Chucky comes to life and starts his typical stuff. But, even more of him this time. More of his jokes, more of his corny humor, more of Chucky. Halfway through the film it goes to Seed of Chucky levels of screentime for him, almost. There's an exchange between him and the crazy ghost lady where he says "I'm a vintage 80's doll and I am standing here, holding, a very sharp object" which she vehemently denies, to which he retorts "Alright, when I'm done, you're next!" *cue laugh track*. That's how this movie feels. Like a sitcom, where all the jokes are pandering, and everything he says feels recycled. That is my major complaint about this film, yes, it's ridiculous. Yes, it's fun like the other movies in a way. But, it just feels like at this point the formula for Chucky really needs a jolting. Yes, this movie does jolt it, but it jolts it in the wrong way. Midway or so through the film they imply that there could be two Chuckies, because the therapist gets another Chucky doll and isn't suspicious about it all.  And guess what, there is two Chuckies, because this is Cult of Chucky. Now you understand the title, it was a spoiler all along! Along the way, Tiffany makes a few minor appearances as well, Chucky's bride from the prior entries in the series, played as always by Jennifer Tilly.  She shows up and tells Fiona that her niece Nica had passed away unfortunately. Of course, the viewer has to know it was Chucky who killed her, obviously. The two chuckies just continue to haphazardly murder their way through this asylum, and there's a scene where Fiona finally realizes that is the case, when the second Chucky flips her off after pulling some bullshit with the girl who thinks he's her baby. So, to review, two chuckies, dead people everywhere, silly jokes and mishaps with Chucky abound. Andy finally appears again, gets himself admitted, and then sits in a room and is unimportant to the plot for another half hour or forty five minutes. The therapist gets yet another Chucky doll, typical. And then he does some creepy ass weird sexual stuff to Fiona before Chucky stops him and says a one liner about how he should just take notes from that guy. That's also a recurring plot from the film, it happens twice and it just feels awkward and completely out of place. Nonetheless, Chucky then reveals that there is indeed two of him, and now a third one can join the fun since the therapist got one. They make some comments about his fucked up hair, bicker with one another, and Chucky barely explains how he just magically learned how to do this voodoo hoodoo, it's the internet. It's always the damn internet's fault! From here on, the film just devolves into a mess. The three Chucks kill some poor guy from the start of the movie, and then fight over who gets to go get Andy, bad haircut Chucky wins. Only to find out Andy sent him there with a gun in his stomach. But it doesn't matter because Chucky possesses Fiona, and now he's out of his doll body finally. Therein lies my major problem with the film. If Chucky is no longer in the doll body, is he really Chucky? No. This movie basically seems to either put an end to the series, or send it in a direction I can't understand. He unravels Andy's plans, and escapes with his wife Tiffany in Fiona's body. There's a brief glimpse of Jennifer's Tiffany doll, so maybe in the sequel they'll both be back? Or they'll simply end the series on this mess of a film. Nonetheless, the story of this movie has all just been revealed to you, so you don't have to waste your time watching it if you aren't a Chucky fanatic. This movie was pretty bad storywise.

(He's not just flipping Fiona off, he's flipping the viewer off too.)

Visuals: Low budget, low expectations. 

Right, the visuals, how do I put this delicately. The visuals look like they were thrown into a video editing program and sloshed together by someone who knows absolutely nothing about what is visually appealing to most people. Everything about this movie looks pretty low budget, the set, the CGI Chucky which I dislike greatly, and the actors of course. The shot selection was confusing at times, and sometimes very disjointing, and there were a few sequences of drug induced craziness that just looked very cheesy or weird. One scene in particular has Fiona in a drug induced haze and a giant Chucky juttingly appears above her with a knife, but it doesn't look scary it just looks odd. It feels completely and utterly out of place as well, since it just cuts to another scene afterward. Don Mancini tried to make this movie like a hypnotic trance, one of those hazes you're in after taking an anti-psychotic, but it feels more like the visual scribbling of a madman. A man without any true vision for the series he claims to love so much. I understand that it's a Chucky film, and I don't expect a visual masterpiece, but I want to at least be able to believe some of the stuff on screen is happening the way it looks. The blood effects are just as over the top as always, that's not what bothers me, what bothers me most is the cheap CGI they used for Chucky. There are times when you can tell he's CGI, and other times it's just a puppet. But the CGI is so bad, it doesn't look believable in the slightest and it just makes Chucky look very ugly and low budget. I miss the days when Chucky was completely Animatronic, but of course that costs more than a measly $1 million budget like this film likely had. The overall visual appeal of this film is not really there, I can't suggest watching it based on that alone at all. 

The Verdict: If you are a diehard fan, bite the bullet, otherwise stay far away. 

Alright, so, I may have seemed harsh in my review of this movie, and that's because I was. I review films from a professional cinematic standpoint, not from the standpoint of a fan. I love Chucky as a series, and I really always have. But that does not mean that I can suggest this movie to anyone else, because on the ground level this movie exists only to serve Chucky fans. If you enjoy Seed of Chucky, you'll enjoy this movie too, even I found some parts to be funny, but there is literally no one else this film would apply to. You'll have to know everything there is to know about the mythology of Chucky to ever understand this tidal wave of a film. It's so self referential, so self obsessed, that anyone who hasn't seen all the prior films would just be confused by all the jokes, all the self parody, all the craziness that is this film. It requires you to watch Curse of Chucky, of course, and every film involving Tiffany, at the least, to understand the weird stuff that goes on. If you live, die, and breathe Chucky you might want to take the time to see this movie, as it does add to the overall mythology in a very weird and broken way, as you probably read in the story part, unless you skipped that. In which case, here's the final verdict: It's a good movie for fans of the franchise, a bad one for anyone who doesn't really really love Chucky and his cheesy nature. Thanks for reading this review, and stay tuned this week for even more!