Ragdoll

movie fiction

Ragdoll
Author: Benjamin Carr
Director: Ted Nicolaou
Producer: Kirk Edward Hansen
Year: 1999
Country: US
110 minutes

Warnings

Violence:

Description:
Blaxsploitation movie with an evil doll. When teenage Kwame's grandmother is attacked by thugs, he uses her conjuring powers to avenge her. But what he unleashes may be even worse.

Qvamp says:

A stereotypical black gay man is one of the main characters. While he regularly swished and lisped, and acted similarly to the 2 stereotypes on 'In Living Color', he also regularly got mad and had a temper. During these times he did not act swishy at all.

Considering this is a complete blaxsploitation film, it wasn't as bad as I was expecting.

Rating	C-
Queer Vampire Rating	C
Amount of Gay Content	alluded to

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Reviews

From Video-a-go-go at http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/Movie/1754/ 5/26/2001

In a conversation I had with David DeCoteau a couple years ago, he mentioned that one of the easiest ways to get Blockbuster to buy Full Moon films was
to have black people on the cover box. It's only natural, then, that the already subdivision-happy company would start a line specializing in, um, “urban”
horror, sci-fi and suspense. Ragdoll is the first release from Alchemy Entertainment, directed by super soul brother Ted Nicolaou from a script by urban
gangsta Benjamin Carr, based on an idea that Charles Band had while he fell asleep watching Dan Curtis' Trilogy of Terror and woke up to James Bond III's
Def By Temptation.
The plot is pretty much standard Full Moon Script #2: The Little Killer Doll Movie. A rap band's lead singer is pressured by drug pusher/pimp/mobster Big
Pear (Big Pear?!?) to sign with them when they've got a deal pending with a real agent. They go so far as to hospitalize his grandmother (singer Payne) and
he feels trapped. In order to get out of the situation, our hero makes a deal with a mystical big-eyeballed fellow named Shadowman that involves a lot of
chanting. Shadowman brings an ugly wooden doll to life in order to kill the gangsters, but the singer's stupidity leads to the deaths of his friends as well.
Little doll runs amok, only more mumbo-jumbo can stop it.
The film starts out on a wrong note with a typical “48-years-ago” prologue involving granny as a child watching her mother destroyed by an unconvincing
window dummy, or possibly a headless zombie. The evil's existence is punctuated by a really irritating noise that may convince you that your stereo is on
the blink. The rap band (and others on the soundtrack) performs several times during the film, an incredibly distracting effect that doesn't fit the mood at all.
One of the gangsters is a rather silly gay stereotype, but thankfully one that does manage to get a few good licks in instead of quivering in the corner.
Despite all of these flaws, the film does have the occasional bright spot. All the actors are competent, and director Nicolaou can pull this sort of thing off in
his sleep, and even dares to move the camera sometimes. (A welcome change of pace from most of Full Moon's rather static output) The doll itself, while
obviously inspired by Trilogy of Terror's Karen Black stalker, is a creepy piece of work, and used sparingly enough to remain an interesting menace. The
tape, oddly enough, is letterboxed, but the sound quality on the copy I had was pretty bad.
Ragdoll is a Full Moon movie, and it shares pretty much the same character traits that all Full Moon product has despite its more “urban” bent. It's got that
dangerous-yet-somehow-innocent quality that some find charming, others irritating as hell. If you're a fan, here you go. If not, this is at least a lot better
than Demonic Toys.