Title: Annabelle
Genre: Horror
Director: John R. Leonetti
IMDB link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3322940/
IMDB synopsis: A couple begins to experience terrifying supernatural occurrences involving a vintage doll shortly after their home is invaded by satanic cultists.

By now you know that I am not the strongest of heart when it comes to watching horror movies, but I watch them anyway because apparently I’m an idiot. Also, I like to be scared.
I started Annabelle waaaay early in the morning because I can’t stand possessed doll movies. In the 1970s, I was scared to DEATH of the Magic trailer because of that weird-looking ventriloquist doll. I rewatched that movie a couple of months ago and it’s still kinda scary.

My list of scary movie dolls or doll type things:
Poltergeist (That damn clown!)
Child’s Play (Only the first one)
Magic (see above)
The Puppetmaster (Ugh, I got chills just typing that.)

But I digress, as a woman with a deep fear of scary movie dolls will do.
Given the creepy movie poster, I figured that Annabelle would join the list.

It didn’t.

First of all, I was annoyed at the main character’s name…..Mia. Can we say Mia Farrow from Rosemary’s Baby? Come on folks….of all the names in the world. Anyhoo, our lovely Mia is given the most evil looking doll ever in the history of movies by her super bland doctor husband and of course, she loves it. I’m like…honey, get yourself an American Girl doll please and thank you.

So la dee dee la dee da, strange things begin to happen of course. She has the baby and they are happy for a bit, then ish starts to jump off, as we all knew it would.

Bonus points for cool sixties/seventies clothes, hairstyles and call backs.

Boo points for the Magical Negro trope, where the Black lady is not only knowledgeable about everything that is bothering poor Mia and the whole curse thing, but sacrifices herself via suicide to save the white couple.

Come
On
Now

We’re not through with this trope yet? And the sad part was, I saw it coming twenty miles away. The even sadder part was the writers didn’t even make an effort to make the journey interesting.

I was also ticked Evelyn (the Black woman) owned a bookstore. Who’s going to run it now that she’s dead? Dammit!

Oh, and the doll is REAL and resides in this weird museum that I saw on Mysteries at the Museum. But in real life it’s a Raggedy Ann doll. I don’t know if that makes it better or worse….

Grade: D
Not even entertaining enough to laugh at or have fun with. Annoying cliches. However, there were good jump scares and some blood.
Watch or not to watch?: Watch it if you like, but even chicken-me wasn’t scared. I guess I was just too busy rolling my eyes.

 

Sidenote:  Look how similar the doll is to the dummy from Magic (1978).  And yes, that’s Sir Anthony Hopkins.