Review of Dead Silence (2007) by Whit W — 08 Oct 2013

Some of the creepiest movies and shows I've seen feature dummies ("Dead of Night", "Magic", Twilight Zone's "The Dummy"), and the best part of this one is the suspenseful moments of silence when we hear the dummy creaking, see its eyes move or notice that it's in a different position than it was before someone turned their back on it. The sound editing and the dummy effects were easily the best part of this. Mary Shaw was a frightening character, too. Especially when she was performing with 'Billy' the Dummy on stage and threatened a young heckler. There is also a moment when they show her face in a crawl space just before she kills Henry that is very effective.

The characters were vanilla but the story was good and I didn't really care that no one in the movie could act. The lack of gore proves that an atmospheric, tense movie beats a hack fest every time. I liked the twist at the end and appreciated that it concluded in dark fashion.