Ragdoll (2023) by Ben Ivory

Director: Ben Ivory (as Ben Daly)

Year: 2023

Country: United Kingdom

Alternate Titles: N/A

Genre: Killer Doll

Plot:

After moving into a new house, a woman, her daughter, and her new girlfriend try to make the most of the situation which is helped along by the discovery of a rag doll left behind by the previous owner, but when they come to find it’s corrupting the daughter must try to stop it.

Review:

Overall, this was a pretty fun if formulaic genre effort. One of the finer aspects of this one comes from the wholly effective setup that provides a solid means of establishing the family dynamic for the doll to play with. While we’re given a derivative series of family squabbles as a divorced family member tries to move on with a new partner against the child’s wishes, this one at least plays with it nicely enough with the interactions between everyone as it sets up how the mother wants to keep the daughter happy while her girlfriend tries to keep the peace. This leads to a nice bit of dramatic tension between everyone where the strain of the situation gives the family just enough conflict with each other that it comes together rather well when the doll can come to life and pit everyone against each other further and leave it to its malicious intentions.

That allows the series of doll attacks to be immensely enjoyable with some fun to be had involving it preying upon the family and their friends. Generally resorting to fantastic ambush encounters while eerie laughing plays in the background to highlight its presence, this sets up a fine series of scenes here involving the doll taking out the ex-husband in his car, the stalking of a friend while babysitting, or the attack on the girlfriend where she’s pushed down the stairs in front of the mother and daughter. With the whole thing set up to frame the daughter for everything as a means of exacerbating the tension at play here, this brings about some intriguing work as it leads to a radically unconventional finale that features this setup rather nicely which combined makes for a fun enough time here.

There are some minor issues to be had with this one. The main factor to be had with this one is the rather familiar and somewhat cliched family drama that takes place here turning this into a generally repetitive genre effort. The new family dynamic at play is pretty much the culprit here where it’s way too familiar regarding the daughter being upset by the disruption and lashing out verbally with unconventional outbursts and comebacks while the mother and new girlfriend try to make the situation make sense due to how supposedly out of character these events are. It doesn’t help that the blank-faced statements and robotic delivery of these encounters offer the kind of enhanced mindset for that storyline where the atrocious performance is a help in believing this setup. Alongside the lack of violence or gore featured, these here are what bring this one down.

Overview: ***/5

A rather fun take on this particular style, this one comes off incredibly well for what it is while a few big issues are enough to bring it down for the most part. Those who are fans of this particular style or the creative crew will have the most to like here while only those who are turned off by these factors should heed caution.