The dialogue isn't ridiculous, and sometimes it's witty: A cynical cop (Donnie Wahlberg) doesn't buy Jamie's theory that the doll had something to do with the murder: "The mystery toy department is down the hall. This is the homicide department."
This new movie is a more credible, less grisly act of filmmaking , but it's a less compelling exercise. It doesn't have the ruthless moral reasoning of the first two "Saw" pictures, however grotesque and specious that reasoning was. But it does have a plot that revolves around a ventriloquist and her demon doll.
This new movie is a more credible, less grisly act of filmmaking , but it's a less compelling exercise. It doesn't have the ruthless moral reasoning of the first two "Saw" pictures, however grotesque and specious that reasoning was. But it does have a plot that revolves around a ventriloquist and her demon doll.
Dolls are innately unnerving, but the movie's semi-menacing Charlie McCarthys never live up to their potential. As creaky nonsense goes, though, this is chock-full of corny goodness down to its hilarious sense-shredding "twist," which the movie reveals like a magician proudly unveiling a dead rabbit.
Dolls are innately unnerving, but the movie's semi-menacing Charlie McCarthys never live up to their potential. As creaky nonsense goes, though, this is chock-full of corny goodness down to its hilarious sense-shredding "twist," which the movie reveals like a magician proudly unveiling a dead rabbit.
There are no two ways about it: A chubby-cheeked dummy doing stuff it shouldn't be doing is spooky stuff. But Wan isn't on such sure footing with his actors -- Wahlberg is stilted as the tough-guy cop, and Kwanten is blandly uninteresting.
The director, James Wan, and the writer, Leigh Whannell (the team behind the controversially brutal "Saw" series), deliver the mandatory shocks and gross-outs, backed by dissonant bursts of music and made almost elegant by the cinematographer John R. Leonetti's desaturated images.
