Bride of Chucky
1998
Director: Ronny Yu
Editor: David Wu
Cinematographer: Peter Pau
Stars: Brad Dourif, Jennifer Tilly
This is a really bad movie. But it is a really good bad movie, like what Charlie's Angels tried to do, but failed miserably. The story deals with Chucky, a serial killer whose soul was put into a doll after his death. For three films, he terrorized various dumb teens, and it seemed as if the last time he was killed in part 3 would be "the last" (always a relative term in these kinds of movies). The novelty of seeing a doll kill people had worn pretty thin, and US audiences were cooling to the horror genre. Fast-forward a few years, and with the success of Scream, horror movies have become profitable again in the US, and it seemed only inevitable that Chucky would be resurrected.
However, this is not just the standard "reguritation sequel" common to the genre. Bride of Chucky takes a different tack on the Chucky story (and US horror movies as a whole) and, as such, is a refreshing change of pace from many other recent US horror films, which seem to concerned with promoting their young stars and looking cool, rather than making an entertaining movie. Even though this is a US-produced film, for all intents and purposes, this is a Hong Kong movie. Everything is there: the over-the-top action, dollops of sex, lots of toilet humor (Wong Jing would be proud), and manic genre shifts. Even the visual style, with dynamic camera angles and lighting, imparts Hong Kong flavor to what might otherwise be a generic cinematic stew.
Anyhow, back to the movie: the first bit reminded me very much of a '60's exploitation flick, with lots of violence, and Jennifer Tilly (as Chucky's ex-girlfriend, who liberates his doll body from a police storage house and then brings him back to life) playing a perfect Russ Meyer-eqsue sex bomb. It's a style which many films have tried to imitate over the past several years, but none of them have captured it like Bride of Chucky. Once Tilly gets turned into a puppet like Chucky, the movie takes a more comedic turn ala Army of Darkness. It was nice seeing a horror movie not have to use lots of self-referential jokes to get humor across. Both Brad Dourif and Tilly's voice acting for the puppets are great and really add a lot to the movie, especially during this part. The final bit turns into more of a standard slasher movie, but is still pretty effective due to the camerawork and editing, and the finale holds a great twist ending involving Chucky's "rebirth" of sorts.
This is not the kind of movie everyone is going to like. But for those with a taste for over-the-top dark humor, "splatschtick" doesn't come much better than Bride of Chucky. The best part of it is, Bride of Chucky knows it's cheesy, and expects you to know that, but doesn't hammer it over your head like some other movies. It's just a great movie to turn off your brain, quaff a few brews, and have some fun either laughing with it or at it.
RATING: 7