X
- 2007
- R
- Universal Pictures
- 1 h 29 m
- 2007
- R
- Universal Pictures
- 1 h 29 m
- 2007
- R
- Universal Pictures
- 1 h 29 m
- 2007
- R
- Universal Pictures
- 1 h 29 m
Where to Watch
Top Cast
Metascore
Generally Unfavorable
Based on 15 Critic Reviews
34
7% Positive
1 Review
1 Review
40% Mixed
6 Reviews
6 Reviews
53% Negative
8 Reviews
8 Reviews
Metascore
Generally Unfavorable
Based on 15 Critic Reviews
34
7% Positive
1 Review
1 Review
40% Mixed
6 Reviews
6 Reviews
53% Negative
8 Reviews
8 Reviews
The dialogue isn't ridiculous, and sometimes it's witty: A cynical cop (Donnie Wahlberg) doesn't buy Jamie's theory that the doll had something to do with the murder: "The mystery toy department is down the hall. This is the homicide department."
Again coaxing the worst imaginable performances out of his actors (see also: Cary Elwes and Danny Glover in "Saw"), Wan casts charisma-free unknown Ryan Kwanten as a young married man whose small-town past catches up to him.
Wan does manage to infuse his film with some of the subtle unsubtleties of classic Euro-horror outings, chief among them the palpable, dreamlike sense of dislocation and the abiding severance from reality that tends to make nongenre fans wonder if someone spiked their popcorn with LSD.
The movie's uninteresting characters, boneheaded dialogue and flagrantly nonsensical narrative detract considerably from the virtues of the visual design.
There are no two ways about it: A chubby-cheeked dummy doing stuff it shouldn't be doing is spooky stuff. But Wan isn't on such sure footing with his actors -- Wahlberg is stilted as the tough-guy cop, and Kwanten is blandly uninteresting.
Only those in a cold sweat for their weekly horror fix will bother with this formulaic and rather lazy exercise in booga-booga scare tactics.
A conflation of the horror genre's laziest tropes, plot angles and shorthands, this inept creation isn't so much a film as it is a smorgasbord.