Day 4: Dead Silence (2007)

Can a once-prolific blogger who hasn't written 31 posts all year find it in his soul to review 31 previously unseen horror films in 31 days of October? Let's find out...

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Found on HBO Go. If you haven't already figured it out, I'm using my three available streaming options for this little 31 in 31 project. Besides HBO Go I'm also using Amazon Prime and Netflix. Not that any of that really matters. I just figured I'd put it out there to rot. Like a pear on a windowsill. Huh?

I mostly picked this one because it's about a homicidal ventriloquist dummy, and there is nothing creepier than a ventriloquist dummy. OK...maybe a clown. Hey, imagine if someone made up a ventriloquist dummy like a clown. That would be super-fucking cree...HOLY FUCK!!!

I call this one "Clown and Clown"

As the film begins, Jason Stackhouse and his wifey have an anonymous package dropped off at their door, and inside is a ventriloquist dummy. Instead of immediately burning it and everything that it touched in a bonfire, they decide it's kinda cool. Big fucking mistake. Especially since Jason Stackhouse tells Detective Donnie Wahlberg that ventriloquist dummies are a bad omen in the town that he's from. That they bring death to those around them. What fucking town is he from? EdgarBergenVille?

Nope. It's Raven's Fair, the former home of crazy Mary Shaw and Billy, her ventriloquist dummy. And it looks like old Mary is back up to her old tricks with the help of her dummy. Even though she died in 1941. Dum dum DAAAAH! Yeah, the dummy that showed up in the package was Billy. He was buried in a separate grave next to Mary Shaw, but someone dug him up to send to Mr. Stackhouse. That's just fucking wrong!

Crazy Mary Shaw had two final requests upon her death.  To have all of her 101 dolls buried with her, and to have the mortician do a taxidermy job on her so that she could become a doll in death herself. That's one weird chick, man. Even since her death, the town has had a dark cloud hanging over it. Entire families killed with their tongues torn out and arranged in death for family photos.

Phew...that's a lot of exposition I just gave you there. I guess all you really need to know about this film is that a crazy ventriloquist and her dummy are killing people from the grave. Your basic ghost story. With ventriloquist dummies. The film has some decent scares, but it's pretty average in most every single way.

By the way, I typed "ventriloquist" about a dozen times for this review. And I spelled it correctly about half the time. Yay for me!

Verdant Dude rating: 2.5 out of 5 pumpkins