Living Doll, the final film to be produced by exploitation legend Dick Randall, is reminiscent of Jörg Buttgereit's infamous shocker Nekromantik (1988), only it is less grim and doesn't go so far as to feature corpse sex. That's not to say that it would make a good date movie or is something that you would want to watch with your gran: it's about a very disturbed individual and contains some fairly revolting scenes.
Mark Jax plays medical student Howard, who secretly worships hospital florist Christine (page 3 stunner Katie Orgill). When Christine turns up on the slab in the hospital morgue, having died in a car crash, the already mentally fragile Howard is pushed over the edge, digging up the young woman's corpse and taking it back to his grubby apartment, where he imagines that she is still alive, dressing her up and holding conversations with her. As the days and weeks pass, Christine starts to decompose, which causes Howard problems with his landlady Mrs. Swartz (Eartha Kitt). And then Christine asks Howard to settle the score with her boyfriend Steve (Marcel Grant), whose carelessness behind the wheel caused her death.
Although not played for laughs, there is definitely some very dark humour in the film, and the resultant uneven tone does lessen its power to shock. That said, there are several moments that are still quite uncomfortable viewing - the autopsy of Christine, the pathologist making an incision to her neck and peeling back the skin; the murder of a transvestite, with a graphic throat slashing; and Howard kissing the putrefying remains of his beloved - most of which were cut from the UK VHS release by those lovely people at the BBFC.
Overall, the film is nowhere near as powerful or memorable as Nekromantik, but if you like your horror dark and twisted, then it's definitely worth a go.
6/10.
N. B. Set in New York, but mostly filmed in London.
