Stephen Blauweiss and Lynn Woods’ documentary considers a 1960s urban renewal project that had the opposite effect on its intended target.
Stephen Blauweiss and Lynn Woods’ documentary considers a 1960s urban renewal project that had the opposite effect on its intended target.
I guess now that Don Mancini is taking the wheel back for the “Child’s Play” series, he can basically do whatever he wants with it. It’s just too bad that he follows up the great “Curse of Chucky” with an utterly inferior sequel that dodges any potential at bringing the premise of Chucky to a new level. “Cult of Chucky” looks shockingly cheaper than the previous film with a lot of green screen and obviously computer animated scenes, all with a back drop of a pretty clumsy riff on “Dream Warriors.” Mancini literally breaks all of the pre-established continuity (who knew ghosts could age?) and mythology in order to bend the premise to his will, failing to provide much of an explanation that’s worth buying in to.
By 1998, the “Child’s Play” movie series reached the point of no return. The third film in the series was a stale slasher, and Wes Craven re-invented the horror movie, while accidentally spawning a slew of self-aware slashers and horror movies. Hence, “Bride of Chucky” came along and took it to a whole new level. The idea of a female version of Chucky is a great one, and one that could have spawned a wonderful and thrilling movie with a change up in the sexual dynamic and how Chucky approaches his murderous habits, but Ronny Yu’s reboot/sequel instead dives head first in to material that’s a spoof, a satire, a sequel, a meta-horror movie, a horror comedy, and sometimes just a flat out slapstick comedy that comes dangerously close to breaking the fourth wall.
You can tell the studios basically ran out of ideas with this third installment of the “Chucky” series, so they pretty much just ripped off “Friday the 13th” part five this time around. This series was begging to be rebooted by the time we reached this new installment, as “Child’s Play 3” is filled with such a bland set piece, and pretty weak character motivations overall. For no real explanation there’s a very young boy in a military academy filled with people in their twenties, and Chucky seems to be running thin on reasons to kill. In the past he killed people that complicated his larger goals, now he kills because people decide to annoy him. Even for a psychopath that gets kind of boring.
In “Child’s Play 2,” director Jon Lafia opts for a more vicious follow up where Chucky goes on a veritable rampage. What made “Child’s Play” so unique is we were never quite sure if Chucky was murdering people, if Andy was, or if Chucky was influencing Andy to become a serial killer. Only on the second act do we get a complete verification of the mystery. In “Child’s Play 2” Chucky is on a campaign of murder and violence where he not only proceeds to ruin Andy’s life, but everyone else’s life in the process. It’s a somewhat polarizing sequel, but something that definitely opts for different this time out.