Pop Culture Buzz

1/2 STAR

I love a good cheesy horror film every now and then. “Dead Alive” is the best corny splatter flick out there, and it also happens to be Peter Jackson’s first film (it also goes by “Brain Dead” in some countries). I don’t know what else I was expecting from this demonic doll movie, but man was I let down in a big way by this flick. There were no gratuitous love scenes, but the bad dialog and special effects were abundant. This movie was just a plain mess with no fun elements to it at all. As it stands “Dolls” from the 80’s is the “Citizen Kane” of killer doll movies, sorry Chucky!

Not even the tag line….”from the makers of “Saw”…could save this piece of crap. I am starting to think the first “Saw” movie was a fluke and every film attached to it from here on out is going to be trash, and not in a good way. The movie starts off with your typical horror movie set up, but even more convoluted than usual. I was hoping to get the urban legend treatment with the story telling but we are subjected to one mind numbing flash back after another. Usually flashbacks help the plot, mind you in an obvious way, but the dream sequences in this movie come off as if they are from a cheap soap opera, “Passions” cheap if you know what I mean.

I won’t give any credibility to the set up or plot summary but the screenwriters had a wealth of material at their disposal but they chose to go the familiar route and be lazy. The only chills are the same tired old tricks we have seen before. Stuff falling out of a closet, a rat walking over a foot in the dark etc. etc. What we don’t get are cool scenes with the dolls killing people. There are no over the top bloody scenes, actually the death scenes are mild. We are forced to watch a slow moving, plot-less mess that never quite delivers the spills or chills.

Lastly, it must suck to be a New Kid on the Block and watch your little brother Marky Mark get all the good jobs. Donnie Wahlberg has become the go to guy for cheap horror films with the label “from the makers of Saw” on it. He never quite gets it right as the intense, and oddly written cop in this movie (and “Saw 1-2″). His presence in this movie is mediocre and silly, his death is the only mildly entertaining part in “Dead Silence”. I can’t even recommend this movie for DVD, which is sad to say about a movie with posessed blood thirsty dolls in it, sigh.