We shared with you the trailer for Dolly the other day, and made comparisons to the style of Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Well, we can confirm that the movie is also in that style, but it is not the Texas Chainsaw Massacre… at all. It is, but it’s also not.
What the hell am I dribbling on about? Well, read on.
In this review, I’m going to have to give some mild spoilers, but I will tag them. In my article about the trailer, I said:
Dolly stars Fabianne Therese, Russ Tiller, Michalina Scorzelli, Kate Cobb, Ethan Suplee, and Sean William Scott. By the looks of the trailer, William Scott dies before the opening credits.
This does and doesn’t happen.
The Story
The story of Dolly is pretty straightforward; a couple go to the woods and ends up in a madman’s house. It’s pretty much Texas Chainsaw Massacre, only Leatherface is Dolly, and she has a thing about looking after babies.
Sadly, Dolly thinks everyone is a baby, and she wants to ‘care for them, and hug them, and they will be her friend’. Dolly doesn’t say this, as she doesn’t talk, but if she could, that’s what she would say.
There is more to the story, and more characters, but I’ve covered the basics.
Dead or Alive? *Spoilers*
Here’s where I have to have a bit of a spoiler tag. I said that William Scott gets killed in the first 10 minutes, and he does. He gets his nut ‘shovelled’ off, and then his jaw ripped open.
It’s pretty hardcore, even for me.
His girlfriend, Macy (played by Fabianne Therese) is the one who becomes the ‘baby’ for Dolly.
But al is not quite as it seems for William Scott. He’s not unite dead yet. Several hours later, in the timeline of the movie, we come back to him.
I don’t know exactly how blood loss works, but I’m pretty sure his body would have been running on fumes.
I laughed even more when he managed to scream for Macy. He manages to do this with most of his lower jaw and neck missing.
Again, I don’t know exactly how vocal cords work, but I’m pretty sure they have to be intact.
If It Bleeds…
If horror movies have taught me one thing, it’s that when you get the upper hand, make it count. Like Sydney said in the original Scream, when Randy says about the killer coming back to life:
“Not in my movie!”
And shoots Ghostface in the head. In Dolly, Macy has several chances to end Dolly’s life, but does she? Of course not. She stabs him, hits him over the head, and whatnot, but when he’s out, does she finish him?
Yes, I know there is a moral issue about killing people, but when you’re in a situation like Macy’s, there is no court in the land that would find her guilty.
It’s one of those cliches that annoys me, the main character making stupid decisions so the plot can happen. A real horror movie would only be 10 minutes long:
“Hey guys, do you want to go the abandoned haunted jail?”
“Of course not!”
Directed by Boba Phil
The other thing about Dolly was that she seemed to be super-strong. At the beginning, it picked up Williams Scott like a rag doll; at another point, it punches a hole right through someone. Was it supernatural? There isn’t a hint anywhere else. I guess the ‘hole punch’ was just to look cool.
Overall
Dolly isn’t a terrible movie; it’s just not a great movie. It pretty much copies the script for Texas Chainsaw Massacre, just change a few of the details, and you’re golden.
However, it doesn’t have the gravitas of the Chainsaw Massacre; there’s nothing outstanding about it. Sure, the character of Dolly is pretty creepy, but the rest of it is a standard affair.
Saying that, I see that Ethen Suplee produced the movie, and fair play to him. Sure, this is an indie movie, and sure, it’s not the greatest thing out there, but it was good to see him and William Scott making stuff like this. I bet they had a blast on set.
I also read that the movie was shot on 16mm, which I respect. The transfer is excellent and, even though it’s more expensive, it’s nice to see something on ‘film’. It’s a lot more difficult to shoot and process.
I did find Dolly entertaining, but for most of the wrong reasons.
On a couple of occasions, I was laughing at it, not with it. However, Dolly, played by Max the Impaler (who I just found out is a female wrestler), was creepy.
The mask was good, and the fact that Dolly doesn’t talk, like Leatherface, makes it creepier.
I’m giving Dolly a generous 2 out of 5 stars. It’s a drinking with your buddy’s movie, and you can have fun with it, but I take my horror seriously. Dolly is a far cry from The Haunting (1963).
Dolly will be in UK cinemas on the 6th of March.
