In order to make it big in the toy business, Elliot Wade (Sam Bottoms) moves his family down to Mexico after purchasing a factory that specializes in life-like dolls -not that kind! As expected, the factory is next door to the recently excavated site of an ancient death cult. An evil spirit gets unleashed by an unlucky anthropologist and possesses one of the newly christened Dolly Dearest dolls. The evil-hosting doll in question just happens to be the one that belongs to his daughter, but dad is the only one who doesn’t believe in such things. Now it’s up to his wife Marilyn (Denise Crosby) and son to take down the little demonic menace before it’s too late.

Well, color me surprised (or just dress me like a doll). I was expecting a dreadful Child’s Play rip-off and got something else entirely. Now I’m not saying that this film wasn’t heavily inspired by or would even exist without the 1988 film but actress turned script supervisor turned writer/director Maria Lease brings the teeny tiny horror goods with Dolly Dearest. The pacing is on point and there’s creepy scenes packed in among the schlockier bits (“Play with THIS, bitch!”). The lovely Denise Crosby (“Star Trek: The Next Generation”) is so damn good in this one. She makes my android heart feel almost human!

The film boasts a decent score from Mark Snow (“The X Files”) and the scenery nibbling-stylings of America’s Treasure, Rip Torn, as a quirky anthropologist. Veteran character actress Lupe Ontiveros makes the most of her short screentime as the housekeeper who knows something is very wrong with the doll and almost does something about it in time. Itty bitty hats off to the child actors in this film. Candace Hutson makes one heck of a creepy little girl once Dolly Dearest gets ahold of her soul. And despite begging for death with his wildly stupid ass decisions during most of the movie, I really like Chris Demetral as the nerdy son.

Dolly Dearest has a tone to it that’s hard to pin down. Even with a few generic horror trappings in the script -the disbelieving husband bit- there’s still a genuine streak of strangeness that I can’t quite put my finger on. The film takes itself just seriously enough to be effective and thankfully doesn’t rely too heavily on corny humor. Solid direction and a well-balanced script for a film about a killer doll? How does that even happen? And another question: is Rip Torn doing a half-assed Mexican accent? You’ll just have to watch and find out!

As usual, Vinegar Syndrome kicks out the jams on yet another of their releases. Dolly Dearest looks and sounds freakin’ fantastic. Fans of the film will be pleased to see that this Blu-ray/DVD combo release kicks the old Lionsgate full screen DVD right in the smooth, featureless doll crotch.

Extras:

There are two cast interviews on Vinegar Syndrome’s release of Dolly Dearest and that’s it. I was hoping for a little more from this release but both interviews are enlightening and entertaining. Denise Crosby is on hand to discuss her excitement of working with director Lease, Sam Bottoms, and Rip Torn. She seems to have had an excellent experience making Dolly Dearest and speaks of her time on the set with fondness. The other interview on the disc is with Ed Gale (of Spaceballs and Child’s Play) who talks about throwing on a dress and wig to play both the baddie and the little girl (for stunts only) in this one. He’s very candid about working on the film and admits to having a huge ego during the time period in question, as well clearing up any possible doll-related conflicts of interest for the filmmakers.

Director – Maria Lease

Cast – Denise Crosby, Sam Bottoms, Rip Torn, Lupe Ontiveros

Country of Origin- US

Discs – 2

Distributor – Vinegar Syndrome

Reviewer – Richard Glenn Schmidt