If you thought that a red band trailer for Curse Of Chucky would be full of blood and expletive-laden puns, you’ll be sorely disappointed. But it’s still probably NSFW for one reason or another.
The murder-loving children’s doll Chucky turns 25 this year, which is enough to make me scream louder than I have watching any of the last few films of the horror series. While the original Child’s Play was extremely corny, it still had a creep-filled charm strong enough to draw out sequel after sequel... with dwindling returns. The above trailer for the direct-to-VOD-and-then-DVD Curse of Chucky, courtesy of Bloody Disgusting, makes this film look like a complete reboot rather than a sequel, as it bypasses the strangely humorous familial storyline that Seed of Chucky continued, and instead returns to the more straightforward slasher plot that made the film franchise so popular to begin with. Only it looks like Chucky hacked out all the fun along with his victims’ intestines.
The trailer follows the same framework as the first trailer, only it replaces more innocent imagery with shots of someone being suffocated with plastic and Chucky kicking over a bucket of water with an aim of electrocution. But we don’t even get a solid trailer line like, “You look electro-cute enough to kiss, bitch,” before he does it. This is a strangely tame red band trailer, and it features the least engaging Chucky we’ve seen in ages. It’d be one thing if it was directed by someone who wasn’t even alive when the original came out, but it’s both written and directed by Chucky’s creator, Don Mancini.
Even when a Chucky film’s plot gets ridiculous, one can still depend on the voice of Brad Dourif to make the doll come alive. But he doesn’t even get to talk in this trailer, though we do get to hear his blood-curdling yell, which is actually my favorite part of any of these films (that scream, combined with the sight of a small object running around, was enough to give me nightmares as a child).
Completely bypassing the last two films, Curse of Chucky takes place after the events of Child’s Play 3, and follows two sisters (Danielle Bisutti and Brad’s daughter Fiona Dourif) who are trying to get their family affairs in order after their mother commits suicide. Chucky arrives in the mail with a personal score to settle, and people start dropping like plastic mass-produced flies. The film also stars A. Martinez, Brennan Elliott and Chantel Quesnelle.
Curse of Chucky will premiere this weekend at this year’s Fantasia Festival in Montreal. It will hit VOD on September 23rd and will be released on DVD and Blu-ray on October 8, either by itself or as part of the “Chucky: The Complete Collection” set. While I enjoy the series and give a lot of credit to Mancini for creating such a slick-looking movie on an $8 million budget, I think I’ll let the more devoted fans tell me how this one turns out.
Check out the film’s Blu-ray cover art below.
