PINUP TIME: JENNIFER BEALS

 

I SAW DOLLY

 

Writer/director Rod Blackhurst's Dolly, based on his novel, Babygirl, held a limited, theatrical release in March, but now makes its full-blown, chilling debut on Shudder. The movie merges elements of Psycho, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, Tourist Trap and The Baby with the behavioral luridness of Ruby Jean Jensen's literary works. 

NWA wrestler Max Lindsey, aka Max the Impaler, plays the titular, hulking entity of ambiguous origin, who resides in a woodland home. When the movie commences, Dolly is seen sitting in an agitated state, much like Leatherface after he's killed the youths in Tobe Hooper's original Chain Saw. It's through Lindsey's effective pantomime that Dolly's urge to remedy her outcast state becomes clear, even if obscured by a cracked, China-doll mask and an oversized, little-girl dress.

Macy (Fabrianne Therese) is the story's protagonist, a young woman set to be engaged to a congenial fellow named Chase (Seann William Scott), whose chipper daughter (Eve Blackhurst) Macy adores. Macy is seized by Dolly when she and Chase get lost in the woods. This leads to a monstrous outcome and the fable's allegorical overlap, for while Macy desires a family, so does Dolly, albeit by forcing Macy to become her "daughter": i.e. an adult-sized infant who's wedged among the brute's grimy toys.

Macy's entrapment consumes most of the story, and one can't help but feel for her, as she's not only smothered by Dolly's repulsive affection, but must come to terms with all she's lost. (These components are, whether by accident or design, evident, Jensen tropes.)    

As Macy adapts to Dolly's creepy lifestyle, we learn she's not its only prisoner. There's a chained-up man in the house named Tobe (Ethan Suplee), but is he a jinxed victim or someone closer to the circumstance's morbid bone? His designation (though eventually revealed) doesn't matter as much as his incapacity to assist Macy, which further stresses how a mere misstep can derail a life. 

Dolly is a disturbing, doleful movie, but also fascinating and outlandish in its macabre passages. That makes it destined for cult status. Heck, I can already see the Halloween costumes and action figures the character will spawn. That's a good thing, too. The world can always use another fanciful, fictional fiend, as opposed to just another exasperating, real one.  

PINUP TIME: JENNIFER BEALS

 

I SAW DUST BUNNY

Bryan (Hannibal: the Series) Fuller's Dust Bunny eluded me for far too long, but it's now a headliner on HBO Max, and so, at long last, I was able to experience its surreal splendor. 

The movie centers on a girl named Aurora, played by Sophie Stone, who harbors a creature under her bed. It kills her foster parents (and the couple isn't the first it's reputedly consumed). In True Grit fashion, she decides to hire a hitman, played by Hannibal lead, Mads Mikkelsen, a stealthy gent who lives in Room 5B of her New York City residence. (She knows "5B" is an assassin, since she watched him slay a series of assailants in Chinatown.) The cynical mercenary believes that whoever killed Aurora's parents meant to kill him and tells his "handler," Sigourney Weaver's Laverne, about the situation. This leads to a complex and dangerous succession that includes a suspicious social worker, Sheila Atim's Brenda, and a ruthless duo played by David Dastmalchian and Rebecca Henderson.   

For the most part, the story is told through Aurora's eyes, in a manner comparable to the youth-propelled Invaders from Mars and Phantasm, though filled with far greater whimsy, a la Martin Scorsese's Hugo. For one, Aurora's surroundings are stylized in both color and scope, her main hub resembling a spruced-up version of Los Angeles' Bradbury Building. To add to the colorful palette, Aurora's segues between quiet desperation and deal-making are heightened by a consistent, unearthly mood, which sometimes makes it difficult to discern what's real and what's reverie, although I suspect that was Fuller's full intent.  

Mikkelsen is the movie's supreme scene-stealer, thanks to the skillful way he dispatches his opponents, some of whom (one should infer) do, indeed, wish to eliminate Aurora, since she does know a little too much from both ends of the spectrum. 

Stone is good, too, as the wide-eyed heroine, who only wants to stop the creature from killing, and Weaver gives her quirkiest portrayal to date, often wavering between by-the-book silliness and Ripley-esque steeliness. 

Due to is offbeat execution, Dust Bunny won't be to everyone's liking. (It comes across like a blur of Luc Besson's Leon and Rob Reiner's North, with the aforementioned, kid-cut thrillers dominating.) Even so, Dust Bunny's motif remains monster oriented from start to finish, and for those who fancy frightful anomalies (whether insinuated, full-fledged or some place in between), this one has much to offer. 

TERRIFIC TEAM-UP IMAGE: GODZILLA'S GREATEST HITS (SUPER 66 TV MARATHON)

 

I SAW WRINKLES THE CLOWN

 

Wrinkles the Clown, a 2019, experimental documentary, has made its way to Netflix.

The concept, directed by Michael Beach Nichols, who coscripted with Christopher K. Walker, isn't what one may expect, as it presents twists and turns regarding an anonymous, Naples, Florida performer who's up for hire among parents who wish to scare their misbehaving children into obedience. Garbed in his weird, forlorn mask and red, white-dotted costume (often manifesting in rigid, Michael Myers style), Wrinkles became and remains a celebrity, but was he ever as active as some believe or just the stuff of social-media hearsay?

The initial part of the documentary focuses on a man said to be the veritable Wrinkles, but he's later unmasked as actor D.B. Lambert, an understudy for the one who reputedly is Wrinkles. The latter, who's silhouetted with voice distortion, consumes the content from such point on, sharing his behavioral and ideological views (and thoughts about his copycat counterparts), but is he no more than another clever ruse?  

Even the renowned "found footage" of Wrinkles (a clip where he emerges from under a little girl's bed) is staged. In addition, some hold firm that Wrinkles never held any official gigs. His "existence" rode off novelty posters, answering-machine recordings and off-the-cuff, phone exchanges (some amiable, others austere).

For the sake of comparison, Nichols' movie marches in step with Orson Welles' F for Fake, a 1973 documentary that covers the mass scare spurred by the Mercery Theatre's The War of the Worlds, as well as art forger Elmyr de Hory and Clifford Irving's prophetic book on Howard Hughes. In this regard, both productions question high-profile deception by exploring when and how fact and fiction merge.  

For Nichols' opus, such ambivalence prompts urban legend (i.e. clowns in white vans who kidnap kids, the sinister Slender Man, et al), but this avenue also reveals the courage one must muster to overcome one's pop-cultural fears. 

The children featured in Wrinkles epitomize this component, as they strive to understand their elusive, gruffy-voiced tormentor and conquer his frightful hold over them. The children's processing reminded me of how I, as a wee boy, learned that monsters were only actors in makeup and then to act out the roles that made Karloff, Lugosi, Chaney and Carradine famous. The kids in Wrinkles walk a similar path, dressing up as their "adversary" for the sheer creative and therapeutic fun of it.  

That resonating outcome is my takeaway from Nichols' venture, and it's an empowering one. It doesn't matter if Wrinkles is (or ever was) an actual entity. It's a matter of what his legacy promotes. If one can see beyond a facade, then one can see the truth behind any front: indeed, a worthy life lesson.  

HAPPY ALIEN DAY 2026 (4/26)