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Film: Dollman vs. Demonic Toys
Year: 1993
Director: Charles Band
Writer: Craig Hamann
Starring: Tim Thomerson, Tracy Scoggins and Melissa Behr
Review:
This was another of these Full Moon films I would watch growing up and I was scared to watch as an adult, not being sure if it would hold up like I wanted. I do have to give credit to them, they decided crossover their franchises. It is interesting though that this would technically be the second film in all of these though, so they aren’t franchises yet. The official synopsis is Judith Grey (Tracy Scoggins) teams with Brick Bardo the Dollman (Tim Thomerson), and his girlfriend Ginger (Melissa Behr) to face the evil Demonic Toys for one final battle.
We kick off getting a recap of the events of Demonic Toys. It turns out that Judith is sitting in the parking lot of the same warehouse, just waiting for something to happen. The events are recapped through her dream to get us caught up. A bum (R.C. Bates) sneaks inside and Judith follows him in. She calls for back-up, but told she is suspended and shouldn’t be in there. The bum dies and this brings back Baby Oopsy-Daisy (voiced by Frank Welker), Jack Attack the creepy Jack-in-the-Box, the Robot and a new soldier action figure called Zombietoid. They sneak off as Judith fires at them. She is confronted by Ray Vernon (Phil Fondacaro) as well as police officers who arrest her.
Brick Bardo the Dollman makes his way to Pootah, where he meets Ginger. He saves her from a spider and they hit it off, being the same size. They both tell each other their stories, which is also a recap of Dollman and Bad Channels. The problem is that Ginger isn’t the girl who was still small at the end, but a high school named Bunny. Being this is Full Moon, I’m not surprised that there’s this continuity error.
Judith seeks the aid of Dollman to help her take out the Demonic Toys. Ginger doesn’t believe her, but decides to tag along as well. Ray is helping the toys by bringing fresh bodies to revive the demon that tried to take over Judith’s unborn baby. This time, Dollman can go where they can, but he also is their size doesn’t give him an advantage.
I think this film has a solid idea to combine these three films personally. You can’t really say franchises, since they are all just solo films. All of them though have smaller things, which Full Moon loved to have. I like Dollman and think it is fun to bring him into the horror film against these toys. The sets being blown up to make the actors look smaller are fun and having the toys the same size is something else I really enjoy. I do think it increases the tension actually, because they can do more damage to these two.
I have to get back to the continuity errors though. There is of course Ginger. I’m fine with having Behr in this film, as she is quite attractive and it makes me wonder if they just liked her better, or couldn’t get the other actress back. There is also the issue of the demon behind the toys. I like that the bum is what brings them back, that isn’t my issue. My issue is that his body disappears. This didn’t happen in the original to my knowledge and I only think it is here to make Judith look crazy. It also doesn’t make sense that the demon can just try again to come back. The first film states that he can only come back every 66 years; this just changes the mythology. I’m probably thinking too much into this, but as someone who loves the story of films, it bothers me. Especially because I feel like they’re just being lazy at times.
This brings me to the pacing of the film. It moves through what happens very quickly, but the problem is this isn’t technically a feature length film. It runs 64 minutes, but I’d say that a good portion of it is giving us recaps of the other three films. I’m not surprised to see Charles Band as the director, because he loves helming these ‘clip shows’, where they reedit films from other ones and just tack on some minor things. For this one, the new footage they shot is pretty solid. I really just wanted more of it. I thought the ending is just a bit abrupt and they could have just done a bit more.
Acting for the film was solid actually. Thomerson is Bardo. He is just a hard cop, who takes nothing from those around him. I would have actually liked to see him in more films as Dollman. Scoggins is also solid back as Judith. She really doesn’t have a lot in this aside from being the catalyst in my eyes of getting Dollman into the warehouse. I would have liked to see a bit more of her character. Behr I thought brings some sass to the film and she is quite attractive as well. The film does like to show off some her body. It was fun to see Fondacaro, who I’m a fan of. I think he was starting to work more with Full Moon around this time. I did find it interesting that Welker did some voice work as I’m a big fan of him. The rest of the cast were fine for what was needed.
This brings me to the effects of the film, which again are pretty solid. The toys are again done with puppets, but they also were allowed to blow up them since they are facing off against people the same size as them. This is still when Full Moon was doing things practically and this is probably the strongest part of the film. There were some times though where it doesn’t look great. The big issue I have with the film though is that there are really no deaths. I think that is something the film could have been better with. Introduce some characters for the toys to kill, because that is what we want more of. The film was also shot fine in my opinion.
To wrap this up, I want to touch on the score of the film, which wasn’t bad, but it loses some points for originality. Whenever the film is showing the history of one of the other previous films, it would play that one’s theme. I don’t mind it, but it isn’t original. I did find it crazy that the rest of the score was done by Quiet Riot. There was one moment with a toy record player, that I don’t buy playing this group, but the rest of it I thought was fitting for what they needed.
Now with that said, this film is quite flawed, but I still have some nostalgia for it. I thought the concept was really good. The world building aspect of it wasn’t a bad move. It really makes for interesting piece of the film to see Bardo and Ginger against toys the same size as theym. It also adds a dimension when fighting the toys. I thought the acting was solid. What I did have issue with was a good portion of the film being a recap and not really adding that much new stuff. I think the film is lacking because of that for sure. The effects were pretty solid, just wanted more which includes more mayhem from the toys. The score borrows a lot from the other films, but I think fits for what was needed still. Because of lack of originality and the minimal new footage, I have to give this film a slightly below average score. I will round it up though.
My Rating: 5 out of 10