Well, three dare movies should be coming in the mail today, and I can’t wait for them to arrive, but since it’s been a few days, I figured I’d inflict a bit of torture on myself in the form of “Dolly Dearest” (dir. Maria Lease 1992).

I watched this movie 10 or 15 years ago, and I remembered it as being a pretty stupid “Child’s Play” rip-off. I’m the type of guy, however, that thinks everyone deserves a second chance, even “Dolly Dearest”. While the second viewing didn’t change my mind on the opinion I formed when I was a kid, I can say in no uncertain terms that watching this movie was a lot of fun.

The Plot: A white family moves to Mexico to a luxurious house near a defunct doll factory. So what’s the twist? The factory was built on, you guessed it, the sacred grounds of a small but powerful ancient culture (Rip Torn plays an industrious archaeologist excavating a sacrificial alter believed to house the remains of a “devil child” that has the head of a goat and, ironically, eats other children).

The daughter becomes taken with one of the left over dolls, and she soon begins spending every waking moment with “Dolly” (rather fitting name, right?). It soon becomes apparent to everybody except the family Dad that this child/toy relationship is anything but healthy, and that there’s something creepy about “that doll”.

What makes it watchable: There is nothing that plays better in a bad movie than a doll or toy that is supposed to be evil, and there’s no better role for a little girl than that of being possessed. You cannot top either of those scenarios for making a crappy movie that’s fun to watch. So, from the very first moment Dolly and little girl meet, you’ve got yourself the makings of a spectacular piece of crap. To boot, I spotted one of the supporting characters from “Chuck and Buck” playing the white family’s maid, which is always fun, as well.

The absolute best part of this movie, however, is the stupid father. I often find myself playing little games in my head while viewing a film like this, and here it was “I’m the best boyfriend in the world because…”. This guy pays absolutely no attention to any of his kids, not to mention his wife. He’s completely oblivious to any signs that everyone around him is in mortal peril, and his idea of starting up a run down doll factory (which, by the way, made the ugliest dolls this side of the Rio Grande) is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard of anybody investing in.

If it was me in this movie instead of him you could expect the following change to the plot:


Or how about this stroke of genius:

All in all, there are few things about this film that weren’t pretty dumb, but I’d be lying if I said that I didn’t enjoy watching every moment of it.

No breaks, no averting my eyes, easily a 7 out of 10.

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!