Don’t chuck him out just yet! I thought I was sick of the possessed ginger doll named Chucky who appeared in seven films from 1988 to 2017, but the fantastic new movie “Child’s Play” ingeniously reinvents the little nuisance. Gone is the silly voodoo curse that transported a criminal’s soul into a toy in the original. Now, Chucky is a technological smart-doll sold by an Apple-like company. Chucky can help you with your homework, turn on the AC, change the TV channel . . . and make ground beef of your enemies. Amid all the gore and laughs, however, is a Siri-ous message about giving a few companies all our most sensitive data. In this dark vision, we’re inching toward a Roomba killing us in our sleep. The wildness begins with the circumstance that gives Chucky (voiced by Mark Hamill!) his appetite for blood: A disgruntled factory worker in Vietnam vindictively sets a “Buddi” toy’s safety protocols to “removed.” The unstable man then hurls himself out a window, and the bad Buddi heads stateside. see also How 'Child's Play' made a new Chucky doll to haunt your dreams This weekend, while Woody and Buzz are making you cry,... The defective device gets into the hands of Karen (Aubrey Plaza), a hardworking young mom who gifts it to her lonely son Andy (a touching Gabriel Bateman). The pair have just moved to town and Andy has no friends. That is, until he meets Chucky. Here’s where the new “Child’s Play” departs most brazenly from its 1988 predecessor. Like targeted Facebook ads, Chucky’s software allows him to learn about his owner: Andy’s likes and dislikes, his relationships. Chucky can take video and make audio recordings. Chucky loves Andy, and will do anything to protect the kid, including murder. This re-imagining of Chucky’s origins manages to be both crazier and more level-headed than the original, in which the doll strolled around Chicago talking like a gangster from “Guys and Dolls.” If that comparatively low-key film went off the rails, then its sequels such as “Bride of Chucky” and “Seed of Chucky” went off a cliff. “Child’s Play” is still more unbelievable than your average episode of “Black Mirror,” but it works in director Lars Klevberg’s boldly stylized vision in which art flirts with camp. The colors are bright reds and blues, and the rooms are lit like the Metropolitan Opera. Paired with Hamill’s nasal but sympathetic voice, it’s an intoxicating circus. Here’s hoping this promising retooled series doesn’t go the way of Toys ‘R’ Us.
Don’t chuck him out just yet! I thought I was sick of the possessed ginger doll named Chucky who appeared in seven films from 1988 to 2017, but the fantastic new movie “Child’s Play” ingeniously reinvents the little nuisance. Gone is the silly voodoo curse that transported a criminal’s soul into a toy in the original. Now, Chucky is a technological smart-doll sold by an Apple-like company. Chucky can help you with your homework, turn on the AC, change the TV channel . . . and make ground beef of your enemies. Amid all the gore and laughs, however, is a Siri-ous message about giving a few companies all our most sensitive data. In this dark vision, we’re inching toward a Roomba killing us in our sleep. The wildness begins with the circumstance that gives Chucky (voiced by Mark Hamill!) his appetite for blood: A disgruntled factory worker in Vietnam vindictively sets a “Buddi” toy’s safety protocols to “removed.” The unstable man then hurls himself out a window, and the bad Buddi heads stateside. see also How 'Child's Play' made a new Chucky doll to haunt your dreams This weekend, while Woody and Buzz are making you cry,... The defective device gets into the hands of Karen (Aubrey Plaza), a hardworking young mom who gifts it to her lonely son Andy (a touching Gabriel Bateman). The pair have just moved to town and Andy has no friends. That is, until he meets Chucky. Here’s where the new “Child’s Play” departs most brazenly from its 1988 predecessor. Like targeted Facebook ads, Chucky’s software allows him to learn about his owner: Andy’s likes and dislikes, his relationships. Chucky can take video and make audio recordings. Chucky loves Andy, and will do anything to protect the kid, including murder. This re-imagining of Chucky’s origins manages to be both crazier and more level-headed than the original, in which the doll strolled around Chicago talking like a gangster from “Guys and Dolls.” If that comparatively low-key film went off the rails, then its sequels such as “Bride of Chucky” and “Seed of Chucky” went off a cliff. “Child’s Play” is still more unbelievable than your average episode of “Black Mirror,” but it works in director Lars Klevberg’s boldly stylized vision in which art flirts with camp. The colors are bright reds and blues, and the rooms are lit like the Metropolitan Opera. Paired with Hamill’s nasal but sympathetic voice, it’s an intoxicating circus. Here’s hoping this promising retooled series doesn’t go the way of Toys ‘R’ Us.
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