Doll Face

"Doll Face" is one of the weirdest movies I've ever seen. Not weird in a "Being John Malkovich" or "Eraserhead" way, weird in a "What the heck am I watching?" sort of way.

"Doll Face" starts with young French woman Marmalade (yes, that's her name) being willed her grandmother's luxury condominium. The condition is that she must take care of all the dolls her grandmother had, and the condo is LOADED with dolls.... they are everywhere. Marmalade seems to have no problems with that, however, and takes well to living with all the dolls. But... strange things seem to start happening. It appears the dolls might be almost alive, and several dolls seem to be trying to get her to hang herself. Is she imagining things? She does seem to be seeing a psychiatrist so she realizes that's a possibility, but the dollmaker that her grandmother insisted she call if anything happens seems to be hinting about some sort of a curse so maybe it's real...

The movie might have been creepy and interesting -- I mean, the whole place is filled with dolls and "creepy dolls" almost always work. But the writer/director used a "probably sounded better when I wrote it" idea, and maybe the most extreme example of "sounded better on paper idea" that I've ever seen. Marmalade is played by the stunningly gorgeous Alix Villaret, and in order to drive home the concept that she is "one" with the dolls, the writer/director decided to make her talk like a doll would. That is, she didn't move her lips and the voice just came out. I'm sure the effect was intended to seem like someone had pulled a string and the voice came out, but it fails hugely. First of all, it's jarring and you NEVER get used to it. Every time it happens, you sort of recoil. Secondly, the effect itself is a disaster -- her voice is clearly dubbed in a separate track and so when she has a conversation with someone, her voice is so obviously on a different vocal track that not only you have to deal with the fact that the person she's talking to seems to have no problem with her talking in sort of a disembodied voice, the voice is in such a different sound level that you want to laugh at the absurdity of the whole thing. And I can't tell you who the writer/director is, because he or she removed themselves from the credits (literally, the credit is "Written and Directed by (just a bunch of smudges)".

I can only assume that once he or she saw the film and how their idea turned out, they just didn't want their name to be involved. Without this crazy "she's just like the dolls" voice thing, it still wouldn't have been a good movie, but would have been more watchable. There would have been creepy dolls, and Alix Villaret works hard and is engaging and, as I said, absolutely beautiful to look at. But even with that, there would be issues. The ending appears to be obvious, but really doesn't meld with most that that had come before, and there's a tacked on coda that appears to be have been added to pad the movie out to 75 minutes.

Can't recommend it, although part of me says you should watch it just to see the whole thing. Hopefully this review has given you a sense about whether it's worth it for you.

What can I say... I love a good campy thriller movie! If you've got a bottle of wine and an hour to kill, it's a fun watch. Makes bold choices. And the girl in it is pretty good.

I have been watching movies now for about 68 years and all I can say is that I haven't seen a film this strange since "Eraser Head". I ran across this film as a Blu-Ray in A Dollar Tree store for$1.25 and decided to check it out. I was pleasantly surprised by its creativity and bizarre trappings. The opening introduces two lawyers that come across as used car salesmen than legal advisors. Then you meet the main character whose name is Marmalade and who never speaks but we can hear her speaking. A condo full of creepy dolls and puppets that seem to do strange things at night. An even creepier doll fixer who just happens to be a homeless guy with phone who works for the lawyers per deceased grandma's contract. A whacked-out Psychotherapist who is of no use to anybody. All in all, the movie is entertaining and keeps your attention. But in the end, you will be asking yourself "What the hell did I just watch?"

Every year my dad gets my siblings and I a bad movie to watch. This year, it was this movie. The lead actress (I think the only female in the whole movie), doesn't even say ONE WORD. Everyone can read her mind, I guess. Fast forward 95% of the film. Did all of these people think this movie was a good idea?

Oh my good god this was so bad, wow! The lead actress who clearly didn't speak English, didn't actually say a single line, she just mimed out her scenes without even moving her mouth and someone else spoke over them, but they were presented in the scenes as if it was normal and people were talking to her which of course didn't work for a second and so the whole thing was full of awkward and stunted scenes with a big what the hell is going on factor! It was so boring and just beyond cheap, I kept starting to nod off as there was nothing happening, just a girl weirdly talking to all kinds of dolls that she inherited, and to their credit some of those dolls did look a little creepy, but you can't make a movie around that, it makes me miss the old days of movies like Puppet Master, and Trilogy of Terror, B-movies some might say, but at least real movies with spooky atmospheres and some genuinely chilling scenes, this film void just sucked so bad, it was insulting, I hope whoever's doll museum they borrowed was deeply offended by how their prize collection was so poorly used. Lol oh my heavens it's so terrible you'll be laughing like a crazy person would after a while, I was! What a complete painful mess I frankly can't believe they had the guts to put it out there for unfortunate people to see as it's not a film it's an elaborate home movie with dolls, don't bother there's really nothing to see like almost literally, it's background noise you don't have to listen to at best, whooee!