Review of Child's Play (1993) by John M — 22 Oct 2010

Before I begin, yes, I am a Chucky fan, but I limited myself to just Child's Play and its third sequel 'Bride of Chucky'. It's one of those slasher films you can't help but think back to your own fears, like with toys coming to life or hearing the boogeyman in your closet. And if you didn't have any of those problems growing up, you might get creeped out by something your own kid has. People both like and dislike Child's Play for that reason.

The notorious pint-size killer, Chucky, is born after gunned down serial killer Charles Lee Ray (named brilliantly after Charles Manson, Lee Harvey Oswald and James Earl Ray who shot President Reagan) uses Voodoo to transfer his soul from his dying body into a Good Guy doll. Six-year-old Andy Barclay (Alex Vincent) has been waiting anxiously to find out if his birthday presents contain one of those Good Guy dolls (and loads of other Good Guy merchandise). His widowed mother Karen (Catherine Hicks) finds one from a peddler just in time to deliver Andy before the day is up! But neither of them know the doll has a mind beyond what it's programmed to do. "Hi, I'm Chucky! Wanna play?" the doll says the instant it comes out of the box. "He's something, isn't he?" Karen replies to her happy son.

Oh, he's something all right! But things go terribly wrong when Andy's babysitter is brutally murdered after falling through the apartment window and down several stories. And what's worse, it seems Chucky has been talking and performing without any batteries inserted! His objective: Seek revenge on the two people responsible for his human demise. One of them is his partner-in-crime who ran off leaving him stranded at the mercy of the other: Detective Mike Norris (Chris Sarandon). But Chucky learns that if he is to escape his plastic body, he must go after the one person he told his secret to, and transfer his soul into that person's body. That person is none other than little Andy!

Child's Play is likely based on an episode from The Twilight Zone where a little girl's doll called Talking Tina terrorizes her father with threatening words. The movie is essentially a one-sentence plot that is both ridiculous and exciting. It may be a predictable horror film, but its creepiness is truly effective. And though we know Chucky is alive from the start, he's wisely obscured by low steadicam shots to view his perspective. We also get small glimpses of his hands and quick timing for each frame. To compromise for any inefficient suspense, the movie makes good use of what Roger Ebert referred to as "false alarms", where you're expecting the surprise but it doesn't come and there's a sigh of relief, and then BANG!

There are only a few scenes in Child's Play where the doll is in complete focus with the actors. Special effects consisted of numerous puppeteers and a little stunt performer for the fire scene. The three leading actors said that Chucky was anything but scary on set because of all the rigging and effects crew present. And Alex Vincent almost never visited the set when his scenes were not filmed. The voice of Chucky was provided by veteran character actor Brad Dourif who also appears as Charles Lee Ray in the first five minutes of the movie. He brings comedic personality to the character and the movie has plenty of humor to spare if the action scenes, particulary the car chase with Sarandon, look too far fetched. Child's Play will either amuse you or intimidate you, but Chucky immediately declares you his "friend 'til the end", whether you accept it or not. "Hidey ho!".