DollI feel like I trudge through Shudder titles every year hoping to land the Late Night With The Devil, Oddity, Birth/Rebirth, or Good Boy, the films that transcend the typical horror slop that seems to traverse to Shudder on a regular basis. I’ve done some films a kindness, and not reviewed them, partially because they didn’t have audio description, and partially because I just don’t have the time to review hundreds of films without audio description.However, Dolly does have audio description, and it is even readily available on the AMC Plus platform. How about them apples?
Dolly is like if someone saw Barbarian, said hold my beer, and then tripped and fell down a set of stairs. Sometimes, the hold my beer effect results in something that is truly better than what came before. Sometimes the film is coherent. Sometimes I don’t spend the entire runtime picking apart little things that would have made for a better film. So, with some admitted spoilers, let’s tackle this… dummy.
Dolly is some giant inbred woman with almost no backstory that we see at the top of the film caressing a dead decapitated body. So, there’s no build up, or big reveal. I don’t even consider that a spoiler, as we meet Dolly before we meet our protagonists. And man, this was a waste of exposition. Chase (Seann William Scott) is clearly defined as a father, of some girl we never get to meet, nor is ever relevant to the story, but she’s brought up in a conversation because he’s considering proposing to his girlfriend Evie (Eve Blackhurst), and she’s also thinking about the whole step-mother thing.It establishes a character totally unnecessary to the plot. It does nothing. At no point is Chase ever worried about getting back to his daughter.The film establishes Evee is great at swiping keys without anyone noticing, a skill set she won’t use again. They drive to a path nearby, because they are locals, and not on vacation. You’d think there would be missing people reports, but, fuck it right? Chase and Evie walk down a trail, he notices some creepy music and walks towards it, then sees some giant thing standing over a crevasse, after walking through a disturbing amount of dolls in what any sane person would walk away from, and approaches this big momma, who nearly instantly renders him useless for the remainder of the film. Then, when Chase doesn’t come back, Evie goes after him, also walking through the metric shit ton of dolls, and then winds up the play thing for Dolly. She’s back at the house, and Dolly is treating her like some weird version of a baby, complete with a breast feeding sequence… because.
Without spoiling every little detail that did nothing for me, Chase finds his way to the house, an impressive feat since he can’t walk, and crawls in to rescue Evie, only for Dolly to rip his jaw off. There aren’t many people for her to kill, so, gotta stretch out his death. Evie does escape, poorly. She has a panic attack in the middle of her escape, for no reason at all, and somehow, Dolly, who can’t run because she’s pigeon-toed, catches up. In the fight for her life, Evie has to stop at Chase’s backpack, for keys I think, but finds the ring and has another dumb moment where she isn’t running, and takes a pocket knife. Eventually, a cop car rolls out there, but he doesn’t last long against Dolly, but it might be just enough time for Evie to get away, if she could only remember she is great at swiping keys.
Why aren’t there a bunch of lost cars out here? Where did Dolly get all these dolls? It is an uncomfortable amount of dolls, in the woods, inside the house, and people just don’t happen to own that many, especially behemoths that wouldn’t function on trips into town. Furthermore, how does Dolly survive? What does Dolly eat? She’s not a cannibal, so where does the food come from? How does Dolly function? Some films establish a side character helping the misguided beast survive, and this film has a version of that, but also not an ally for Dolly. And, it is unclear how that person would help Dolly.
I know, some horror fans were like, damn. My God. Amazing. I was like, what is this? Is this a real script? Did anyone do a pass on this other than the first time through? Did we just run on the first draft, and not bother with hiring a script supervisor, or anyone who might have questions or concerns regarding continuity?
This is a film, which because I watched it a little after its theatrical release, and then I’m even reviewing it a little after that, continues to sour in my brain. It isn’t getting better. I still remember watching this and being constantly confused by the choices. I don’t get it. I don’t understand why the choices were made, and I certainly would need heavy convincing from people who liked this. I’ve been told Dolly is a new horror icon. I suppose, if the plan is for her to kill stupid people with unnecessary backgrounds, there is a market for that? Why not double down in Dolly 2: Dollywoods with characters with even deeper backstories they never use. Establish someone as being former black ops, but they never seem to use any of those skills. Give someone a long winded backstory, about their family, and they are just holding it together. Everyone has cancer but this one person, who is working to keep everyone afloat, and have them wander into the woods with nary a thought in their heads.
Yes, there’s audio description, and yes, it was adequate. More than. It leaned into the gore and violence like it needed to, pointed out as much horror and creepy stuff, and tried its best to define what Dolly is.Sadly, what Dolly is, truly is something I don’t like, that just reminds me Barbarian is a better film, and Zack Cregger is a better director.
If Dolly impresses you, it says less about your taste in horror films, and more about the state of the genre as a whole. You don’t blame the man drinking sand at the mirage, you get upset and concerned at the lack of potable water in the area. Maybe it’s time to revisit the classics.
Rotten: 4.3/10
