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The Boy (2016)
Reviewed on 2016 January 24
I wasn’t gung-ho on seeing a PG-13 movie about yet another freaking creepy doll, but the things a buddy and I really wanted to see were further away than we felt like driving this afternoon. We chose this, and I was pleasantly surprised. My friend, who isn’t the horror movie ghoul I am, got a kick out of it too.
Greta Evans (Lauren Cohan) is trying to get away from a bad situation and takes a job as a nanny at a superficially posh house in the English countryside. The house is almost cartoonishly spooky on the inside, and her new bosses are not the parents she was expecting. Mr. Heelshire (Jim Norton) seems beaten down by life despite his wealth, and Mrs. Heelshire (Diana Hardcastle) is a stickler for rules for her new charge, Brahms. Brahms turns out to be an eerie-looking boy-sized doll, yet Mrs. Heelshire insists that the rules, from waking at 7:00 every morning to a good night smooch at bed time, must be followed for little “Brahms.” Things get interesting after they go on holiday — perhaps little Brahms really is alive, and they’re not crazy.
Yes, there was a lot wrong with this, the first being a woman in her right mind staying in that isolated house with obviously disturbed people or not running for the hills at the thought of that nasty doll walking around under its own power. There were some silly things in this but I can overlook that because the mood and atmosphere made it work. I’ll be blunt, I went into this thing expecting a dumb movie. I wasn’t expecting much from this after Chucky, and I wasn’t feeling all that great when I watched it. I think I had low-grade food poisoning, so not only did I have an axe to grind already, but my guts were sharpening it for me. Still, I promised my friend I’d see it with her, and since it was something I ate and couldn’t share the joy, I kept my word. It entertained me and it also distracted me from my problems. What more can you ask from a film?
Two chocolate morsels, and a nice PB & J. Not bad at all.
— Shukti
