7. Horror Films Confronted Us With A Heap Of Creepy Dolls
Seen In: Goosebumps, Poltergeist, The Woman In Black: The Angel Of Death, Krampus, The Boy, Robert The Doll, Ghost Theater Ever since Michael Redgrave was menaced by a ventriloquist's dummy in Ealing's Dead Of Night, creepy dolls have been an enduring mainstay of horror cinema. In 2015, though, you could hardly turn around without seeing a grinning, dead eyed, porcelain face. Is this a sign of horror's increasing dearth of new and original ideas? Quite possibly, especially when you consider how many of 2015's dolls and dummies were making far from their first appearance. The clown doll was one of the most memorable parts of the original Poltergeist, so naturally it was always going to show up in the remake. Similarly, Slappy the Dummy is a sort of unofficial mascot for kids horror series Goosebumps, so had to appear in the Jack Black movie version. Meanwhile, creepy toys had been a major feature of Hammer's first Woman In Black film, so it was no surprise to see a doll feature heavily in the sequel. By the end of the year, festive fairytale monster Krampus came accompanied by a carniverous jack-in-the-box, his monstrous toy sidekicks, and a trailer for The Boy, an utterly derivative tale of a girl babysitting for a possessed doll. The latter is no less derivative, and a lot more polished, than supposed true story Brit horror Robert The Doll, which made a brief appearance in the summer of 2015. It wasn't just in the English speaking world, though, that 2015's horrors were filled with killer dolls. Ring director Hideo Nakata's Ghost Theater featured a malevolent doll as a theatrical prop menacing young actresses, and was just as unexciting as most of these others.
