Review by Ben Bussey
There’s something so nice about Curse of Chucky. Sure, it’s a nasty little movie full of duplicitous back-stabbers, some of whom do end up literally getting stabbed, or dying in some other hideous and spectacular fashion – but it still can’t help bringing that warm and fuzzy feeling. It’s the sixth instalment in the Child’s Play series (released within spitting distance of the original film’s twenty-fifth anniversary) – and it isn’t a remake, or lazy cash grab direct-to-DVD movie done purely so a greedy studio can hold onto the rights. Well, okay, it has gone straight to DVD, and I know I’m not alone in saying I’m a little surprised and irritated by that decision, but my point remains: unlike pretty much every other treatment of the great 80s horror franchises that we have seen in the last decade, this is not a cynical movie made for cynical reasons, signed off by some indifferent studio exec to some wannabe hot-shot up-and-coming director with a view to a massive opening weekend and very little concern about anything else. No, this is a film made by people who love the characters and want to explore their storyworld further in an interesting and exciting way. And it’s reassuring to see that the filmmakers do feel this way – as they’re the very people who created Child’s Play in the first place.
Let’s be honest, now… how many of us have quietly cursed John Carpenter under our breath time and again this past decade? The way he’s been perfectly content to take the money and sit back unconcerned as so many of his masterworks were soullessly rehashed? No, the remakes of Halloween, The Fog, Assault on Precinct 13 and The Thing (yes, itself a remake, let’s not start that one again) do not in any way invalidate the brilliance Carpenter’s original movies, and given how much joy the man has brought us we can’t begrudge him wanting to be cosy in his twilight years, but even so – it’s hard not be pained by that sense of complete indifference as Hollywood bean-counters wipe their overpaid asses on his legacy.
As such, it’s also hard not to break out in applause for Don Mancini and David Kirschner. How many offers must these guys have had? How easy would it have been for them to simply sign away the franchise they created, and watch Chucky suffer the same treatment as Jason, Freddy, Pinhead et al? Frankly, once upon a time I might have expected nothing less of them, given how repetitive the Child’s Play movies became with Parts 2 and 3. But no. They held on to their baby. They tried different approaches, some of which worked (see Bride of Chucky), some of which didn’t (see Seed of Chucky). And now they’ve gone back to basics in pretty much the best possible way: rebooting without rebooting, recapturing the spirit of the movie that started it all but not just retracing their steps.
I’m almost surprised they didn’t bring back the Child’s Play title. Calling it Curse of Chucky implies it’ll follow on from the more comedic Bride and Seed, but that really isn’t the case at all; in terms of tone and content this really harks back to the original. Unless I’m very much mistaken, Curse of Chucky was originally conceived as a remake (don’t quote me, but I recall reports to that effect a few years back), and it could very easily have played out as such. One of the strengths of the Child’s Play movies – and one the advantages to them having filled out the series gradually, as opposed to splurging them out on a Friday the 13th/Saw-style assembly line – is that each film largely works on a standalone basis. If you go in knowing nothing more than the fact that it’s about a possessed toy who kills people, that’s absolutely fine. So it is that Curse of Chucky opens as though it could be any movie, with wheelchair-bound twentysomething Nica (Fiona Dourif) suffering quietly through life with her emotionally troubled, apron-string tugging mother (Chantal Quesnelle). Then all of a sudden, a mysterious parcel arrives, with some old doll inside. Neither mother nor daughter thinks much of it – but then only one of them makes it through the night alive.
Next day Nica finds herself with a full house, as her similarly overbearing sister (Danielle Bisutti) shows up, with her husband (Brennan Elliot), daughter (Summer H Howell), and their live-in nanny (Maitland McConnell) in tow, plus a priest (A Martinez) along to do whatever men in his position are supposed to under these circumstances. As is perhaps the norm, what is meant to be a healthy mourning period winds up anything but, with all manner of tensions popping up between all parties – and, wouldn’t you know it, strange things start happening, particularly once little Alice starts getting chummy with Chucky.
I’m torn between two key feelings as regards Curse of Chucky going straight to DVD: on the one hand, I feel it’s a terrible disservice to a movie that deserves more, and which had the potential do okay at the box office; on the other hand, perhaps it’s long since time we cast aside the stigma of straight to DVD releases. After all, the bulk of the best horror movies these days rarely play the big screen outside of festivals, as has of course been the case here (Steph caught it at FrightFest). They don’t all have to wind up like the Lost Boys or From Dusk Till Dawn sequels; there is room for really intelligent filmmaking in this arena. And that’s very much what Don Mancini has delivered here. Curse of Chucky looks great, and is shot in a very interesting way which I daresay highlights what a student of cinema Mancini really is. Indeed, perhaps I was wrong earlier to suggest this film doesn’t carry on in the spirit of Bride and Seed, for in its own way it’s equally self-referential and loaded with nods to other films; but the vital difference here is that, by and large, Mancini isn’t playing it for laughs.
From the moment Chucky enters the picture, lying apparently lifeless in a cardboard box, the dread starts to build; yes, we all know damn well the doll’s going to come to life, but we don’t know when. Until that moment, Chucky is just an object in the background, but one which draws our attention, and the film effectively builds suspense as we wait on tenderhooks for him to make his first move. In the meantime we get to know the characters in this creepy old house, and happily they prove as intriguing as their surroundings, and Mancini captures both cast and setting quite beautifully with a camera that’s smoothly, almost imperceptibly on the move at all times.
Sure, we have smartphones, laptops and webcams all coming into play (and even a snippet midway when, yes, Chucky goes found footage), but all in all there’s something very old fashioned about Curse of Chucky, harking back to the very earliest days of the slasher – Bava’s Bay of Blood, for instance – when the stories were more along the lines of Agatha Christie murder mysteries with particularly gruesome death scenes. As time went on, this format naturally wound up with the Friday the 13th format of a gory kill every ten minutes or so. However, while Mancini doesn’t spare us the gore, he wisely doesn’t neglect to bring in surprises of other kinds, with various red herrings giving way to character developments we might not have anticipated.
It’s all pulled off wonderfully by the cast. Danielle Bisutti does beautifully as everyone’s worst nightmare of a sibling, Brennan Elliot is great as the husband who’s clearly had his fill of taking shit, Summer H Howell is the ideal innocent little girl – and of course, Brad Dourif picks it all up like it was only yesterday. Still, the clear star of the show is Fiona Dourif. Obviously the temptation is there to scream nepotism given who her father is (check the surnnames if you haven’t twigged yet), but there can be no doubt this is an actress of great charisma and gravitas, who I daresay has real scream queen potential. (Room for a little plug – fans of Ms Dourif might want to check out the Kickstarter for one of her next projects, the UK-based short film She.)
Yes, all in all I was very impressed with Curse of Chucky. Now, if only it had had the good sense to end about five minutes earlier… don’t worry, I’m not going to get into spoilers, but the narrative reaches its natural conclusion only for the film to carry on, for the sake of a couple of scenes which serve only to please existing fans of the series without in any way serving this specific story. It’s too bad that Mancini chose to leave things on such a self-indulgent note, given what a refreshingly lean and self contained film Curse of Chucky is for the most part. Still, such a minor offence can be excused given how well done everything else is. I’m half tempted to declare this the best movie in the Child’s Play series yet, but that might be premature – even so, I’d definitely say it’s straight up there in the top three, along with the original and Bride.
(It’s also a shame that the DVD is, in the words of the press release, ‘vanilla’ – but there look to be plenty of decent extras on the Blu-Ray.)
Curse of Chucky is released to Region 2 DVD, Blu-Ray & Ultraviolet on 21st October 2013, from Universal.