Powerful

Don't listen to the negative reviews

The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.

I was surprised when I found out that Leonard Maltin gave this film a three stars rating. It's not one of the worst shown on MST3K, but it's still really bad. I admit that the premise isn't that terrible. I think this might have worked if it was just a short film. Like most movies of this time, it has the flaw of using too much of its length for exposition and not showing us interesting imagery. It's weird to see black and white movies decline at this point. It really looks dated.The most interesting part of the film is in fact when we learn more about the backstory, but even that seems to go on too long. It really is funny just watching this silly dummy walk around and attack people. Then again, that doesn't really show up until the very end of the movie. It's mostly pointless and there's not much to talk about. I'm surprised MST3K didn't make a joke about Maltin's review, but then again, they did already do that in "The Undead". I was hoping this would be in color. *1/2

and it was the MST3K guys who got to it first.Okay, trying to relate to this film on its own merits. The Great Vorelli is a hypnotist who puts the spirit of a young German boy into a dummy, but has a hard time controlling him while trying to seduce his way to a meal ticket rich British chick.In some ways, this proceeds the classic "Magic" with Anthony Hopkins as a whole "Ventriloquist's dummy goes horribly wrong" theme. Is it worth watching? Not really. It stuffs 30 minutes of plot into a 90 minute film.I realize that IMDb is a British site, but are you people just easier to scare than Americans? This movie wasn't scary at all!

While watching this film you often have the feeling that this was supposed to be a longer, more fleshed out film. Vorelli re-gluing his beard back on is never really explained, among a few other open-ended events.The one thing that can be said is that this film is genuinely creepy at several points throughout. Watching it late at night in the dark when everyone else is asleep will lead to looks over one's shoulder! The fight scene at the end between Vorelli and Hugo is actually nightmare inducing! If you have the chance, do see it! Oh, how I long for the actually SCARY films of days gone by! Hey Hollywood take note... CGI doesn't scare anyone! A film like this one will definitely give you the heebies and the jeebies! If you want to see a creepy movie, get a hold of this one!

I don't think I will ever regard "Devil Doll" as a classic or even a "good" film, but I have to admit that there is, in spots, some decent film making going on here. The obvious comparisons for this movie would be to "Magic", "Child's Play" or even (for the real film buffs among us) "Dead of Night". Indeed this movie works many of those same visual aspects and themes. "Devil Doll" does have a good twist, though in that the dummy, who initially seems to be a sinister, evil figure, turns out instead to be a victim of the the ventriloquist (the "Great Vorelli"), rather than the usual way around. And Hugo (the dummy) manages to turn the tables on Vorelli at the very last moment (in an unintentionally hilarious fight scene that will make you snort milk out your nose). "Devil Doll" also reminds me of "She Creature", another black and white horror manqué about a hypnotist/magician using his Svengali like powers to make a beautiful woman his slave. Same grainy black and white noir photography, same dreary staging and pacing, and the same morally repulsive villain locked in a struggle with a rather bland 'hero' for the soul of a beautiful woman.I know all this sounds good, but alas, the execution is somewhat lacking. In spite of a very energetic opening orchestral introduction and enigmatic credit sequence, and some interesting acting choices and creepy individual scenes and close-ups, "Devil Doll" soon bogs down into an endless succession of scenes of people talking, smoking, talking, smoking some more, talking some more, mixed in with disturbing moments of Vorelli taunting the dummy, both on-stage and off. Bryant Haliday and William Sylvester (as Vorelli and the chain smoking reporter hero "English", respectively) give this material their best shots. Unfortunately, Vorelli is an amoral creep, and English is bland and uninteresting. Every other character in the story is either a victim (the man whose spirit is stuffed into "Hugo" and his family, the girlfriend) or a dupe (all the audience members, Vorelli's stage assistant). So there isn't a whole lot here to root for. If Sylvester's character had been written to be more effective and interesting, maybe the movie might have had more energy to it. Or maybe not. While some of the individual shots and closeups of Hugo, VOrelli, and English are quite effective, and while Haliday does a great magician/slime-ball, there is an aura of seediness and dreariness over all the proceedings that is compounded by smeared lighting and photography , and muffled, garbled sound design.(This might have been the fault of a bad print, I can't tell.) Seediness and dreariness might have been the feelings the filmmakers were trying to create - as I said, Vorelli is a human hairball, and the movie is essentially about him and his attempts to enslave a woman via hypnosis - but 90+ minutes of this atmosphere and pacing doesn't go down well to my modern American palette. Still, if you keep your eyes open and your attention tuned, you will find some nice acting and some moody moments buried among the smothering farina of the screenplay. I wouldn't spend any money to buy this, but I would watch it on late night cable if nothing more interesting was on.