Genre: Horror
Director: Lindsay Shonteff
Starring: Bryant Haliday, William Sylvester, Yvonne Romain
MST Season: 8
The Movie
A hypnotist named the Great Vorelli tours London and becomes infatuated with socialite Marianne Horn. He uses his hypnosis to get closer to her and influence her to eventually become his lover. But Marianne's fiancé Mark English becomes interested in the mystery behind Vorelli's ventriloquist dummy Hugo, which Vorelli can seemingly make walk all by himself. The deeper Mark digs into Vorelli's past, the more it becomes clear that Hugo may very well be possessed by a human soul.
Storytelling has a history of being interested in dolls that are alive in some manner. Two long running horror franchises are both Child's Play and Puppet Master, which continue to this day. Episodes of The Twilight Zone are devoted to it, even to the point of being parodied directly by episodes of The Simpsons. The Conjuring franchise used the "true story" (is it though?) of a demon-possessed Raggedy Anne doll as the basis for a group of Annabelle films that had no basis on actual events at all (even if you do accept that the real life doll is actually possessed). Hell, one of the most popular Goosebumps stories is a living dummy named Slappy. Outside of horror, Toy Story certainly has young ones captivated by the concept of living toys. Devil Doll certainly isn't a unique tale and it doesn't match the talent of the best of them, but if there is one thing it has it's that it has mood to spare. It's a very moody movie, so dark and depressing.
It's also a bit slow and it takes forever to get where its going. The movie spends so much time letting Bryant Haliday drone himself on with a monotone. It gets tiresome. It's not all that uninteresting a story, though it plays out like a blur of greyness, as characters get more sickly and tired as it goes on, leaving the audience as sickly and tired as its characters. It's a draining movie, and not in a good "That movie moved me" sort of way. The only way this movie will hit you emotions is by making you wishing it was over so you can see some color in your life.
However, credit where credit is due, it's a competently made movie, and it's not exactly "bad" even though I have a hard time seeing someone just casually put it on by choice. There are movies that do this story better than this film does and are more entertaining and engaging. Devil Doll may have had a hint of novelty back in the 60's, but it has been trumped many times since then.
The Episode
Devil Doll is a precursor to the British Invasion trilogy of the ninth season, which doesn't bode well for it. Those episodes are fairly dry and dull, and Mike and the Bots had trouble making them lively. With Devil Doll being a fairly labored film itself, this episode could really be a drag. However the one thing that this movie has going for it that Mike and the Bots just feast upon is that it's a very stoic presentation of a very silly story. Our crew notices the tone of it and just ravage it. One thing that they do here that I find brilliant is that they add touches of sunshine and roses to the movie but present the idea with the same tone the movie presents itself with, whether it be a pair of craggy, grumpy men walking into a room of the sickly Marianne saying "We're here to comfort you!" or the Great Vorelli himself with his stone cold face saying "I skipped and sang all the way over here."
And then there is Hugo the Dummy, which they smartly use as a narrative commentator. Usually he sits stationary during many scenes watching events unfold, and if a riff needs to be said, they'll give that line to Hugo, because he is a character that is so easy to project themselves through. And oddly enough there is a lot of personality traits for them to latch onto for Hugo, including a love for ham and a generally grumpy demeanor. Hugo is a memorable character and he doesn't even do that much.
"Did I just watch somebody walk in and paw my puppet?"
The host segments are led off with a personal favorite of mine in which the Bots host a dorm party, but instead of speakers and beer they buy a window. It's very simple and dumb, but I love hearing Servo's explanation for buying a window and all the reasons he wants to keep it even though he has no use for it. I even love how it's just sitting in the middle of the control console desk for no reason. The segment just makes me giggle just thinking about it. It's followed up by a great segment in which Crow pretends he's drunk, gets upset about a woman named "DEBBIE!," and breaks it for no reason. It's hard to explain why I enjoy these segments as much as I do, I just delight in them. We also get the return of Pitch the Devil, played by Paul Chaplin, who is a very bad influence on Crow. He gets the Bot into the hobby of buying satanic dolls and teaches him how to transfer Servo's soul, which winds up in something hilariously random as a toaster strudel and he spends the last quarter of the episode as a breakfast pastry. Rounding everything out is the pub segment, which is cute but not that funny, while Pearl and Observer have a "Pants Party!" down in Roman Times, which is delightful.
The latter eighth season winning streak is still in full force. In some ways Devil Doll is a "weak link" in it, but that's only by microscopic details. It's a worthy episode that gets funnier the more I watch it. As much as this movie shouldn't work, they really found a groove for it, and the episode is a gem that's worth a look.
Good
DEBBIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!
The DVD
Devil Doll came to life and ate some ham as a part of Shout Factory's Volume XIX collection. The episode featured solid audio and video, while the special features were led off with an interview with producer Richard Gordon, who accounts the making of the film. It's fairly basic stuff, but there are some neat tidbits, including finding the story the film was based upon and how the director was a replacement choice by the film's original director. Also featured is a trailer for the film.
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