The Dummy

Low budget horror movie about mentally troubled ventriloquist Paul Chandler (Keith Singleton) and his apparently murderous dummy Tommy. The UK DVD sleeve has some cool looking artwork and the tagline "People say we have a killer act", well I can assure you that this film is certainly not killer. I was hardly expecting another "Dead of Night" (1945) or "Magic" (1978) and the current IMDB rating of 1.8/10 I feel to be pretty fair. This is one of those movies that one person (Singleton) wrote, directs, produces and stars in, I tend to give these credit for trying though the end result is often poor (as is the case here). He has very few credits to his name but did appear in the slasher "Student Bodies" (1981) and is a professional ventriloquist. I guess being the leading man meant that he got to be in the movie's only sex scene, which is quite steamy and may account for its age 18 rating (as opposed to the violence and gore, which is pretty tame). There is a failed attempt to inject some Voodoo/Black Magic into the plot. The acting certainly isn't good but I wouldn't call it terrible either. But was is terrible is the UK DVD, the picture quality is very poor and it is also badly cropped. I ended up watching it in 4:3 ratio, 16:9 looked too stretched but it still sucked. Had it looked better I may have scored it 3/10 instead of 2. My son watched it with me and he laughed at it, at least at 83 minutes in length it didn't feel like too much of an ordeal.

It shouldn't take a genius to see that the DVD transfer in the U.K. was botched by being zoomed all the way in. All you can see is the exact center of the frame, making any review of the picture meaningless. The DVD transfer facility further maligned it with a constant jiggle. It's only fair to point this out, and unfair not to.

The U.S. release on VHS proves the movie has smooth cinematography. But don't expect any bloodbath or special effects. It's an eerie melodrama and not a horror movie by any means, which can antagonize those attracted to the box art.

Written, produced, directed and starred in by Keith Singleton, this film is quite simply the worst I have ever seen. Admittedly, the female cast is quite easy on the eye, yet Singleton could think of nothing more imaginative than a quite gratuitous sex seen involving him and his 'suspicious' girlfriend.

Some of the scenes are quite simply bizarre- to pick one, the camera (shaky and excessively zoomed in as is the case in the majority of the film) pans across to a Matron like figure in the office of the psychiatrist (who is possibly the worst actor you will ever see), accompanied by the ever present, bizarrely selected and ludicrously timed 'tension creating soundtrack'. The one point in the film where you are led to believe that there may be a twist in the storyline, nothing more is seen of this mysterious figure!

Possibly the worst thing about this film is that, unlike the case in many other poor films, Singleton seems to have made the film in complete sincerity, so even the 'comedy badness' edge is absent.

If only there were a 0/10 category...

What a disaster! The Dummy must be one of the worst films I've ever seen, all genres included. There's no suspense, no plot, no class, no idea whatsoever... The acting is very bad, which points to two directions. The cast is either put together of a bunch of amateurs or there's a total lack of direction. The budget obviously makes the first assumption a plausible one - but direction is still awful.

My guess is that they have made up the most of the story as they went, otherwise it is hard to explain all the continuity problems and the whole mess this film is. You really don't start to care about the characters. The film does have a 'script' but this formula has been used so many times that since they add nothing original to it, no surprise twists or anything, the movie is a total bore.

Cinematography is generally very shaky. Sometimes they have tried to use some odd angles but that approach does not deliver. But I'd say it is more the editing, not the cinematography itself that causes it. Lightning is bad, colors are washed out and hardly on purpose. The special effects do not fail, because there aren't any. Which of course is a bad thing in a horror(?) film, even though this film never promises to be one - except in the poster! The ending is a letdown regardless of what way you want to see the movie.

The only interesting thing, as pointed out in other reviews as well, is a longish and completely gratuitous nude scene by the leading actress. It keeps an average (male) viewer interested - but not for long. Also the other risqué scenes of the film are so totally not on a par with this scene that it is even harder to understand the motive to include this one. Though the leading lady has a long list of credits and even some in the U.S. her acting too is terrible at times. On the other hand she's quite easy on the eye, unlike anything else in this movie.

A word of warning: If you are planning to see this, you first seriously need to consider if there could be better ways to spend 90 minutes of your life...

Apparently the DVD transfer was zoomed in too far, cropping off actors heads and short-circuiting visual nuances and award-winning cinematography. In truth, one of the best photographed films of it's budget. Every shot except 2 or 3 are anchored with a tripod, though poor transfers make it appear a bit shaky in places.

The script does assume too much awareness of the subtle implications of the ongoing classic "jekyll-hyde" premise of the ventriloquist being taken over by his dummy, and editing needs to be tightened up. Good example of how script and final editing reflects on actor's talent, giving them too much of the credit or too much of the blame. It has to work on the page or it won't work on the stage.

The poster promises a horror show with blood and violent special effects. In actuality it's a subtle character study of the effects of schizophrenia, and not much violence. Gorehounds will be let down. Beware.

The female lead, Irina Bjorklund, recently won the Academy Award in Finland for Best Actress after many starring roles there in record-breaking major films. This was her first American film. Best seen on VHS, NTSC version available in America.