Arriving at an ancient Italian castle, a professor and his staff attempting to document the findings with a group of antiquities experts finds they have released a series of dolls possessed by an evil, demonic energy and must race to find a way out alive.
This here was a decent enough if slightly flawed effort. One of the main elements going for this one is the fact that there's quite a large amount of Gothic atmosphere found here in the main location as this one really lets the castle location come through quite nicely. This features all the usual grand set-pieces and designs that come about here through the location taking place here, from the scenes of them wandering about the castle going for the various rooms and settings featured here while taking full advantage of material that can be attempted here with the elaborate, ornate decorations, candelabra- lit rooms, secret passageways and much more that makes this one quite a bit more fun than it really should be putting the Gothic set-pieces into the hunting grounds for the toys. With the discovery of the different rooms featured within here, especially the torture chamber and the exorcism vault that are found here, they make for a great place here which gives the dolls a spectacular place to hunt, generating the great stalking scenes in the basement where they take out the cheating couple or in the big bedroom against the one unaware loner who gets tormented beforehand with all the various sights and sounds of them appearing before the final kill which is quite impressive and enjoyable. Once they finally reveal themselves here which comes at the end of the big seance sequence which itself is a fantastic highlight offering with the flashing lights, demonic voices and the overall resolution of the main plot line being revealed to them, this one readily picks up the action and becomes a thrilling, suspenseful series of chasing through the bowels of the castle trying to fight them off in order to get away which makes for a fine finish here. These here make this one quite fun and enjoyable, though it does have a few quite detrimental issues. The main one here is the fact that the film's rather long periods of time here without the dolls being a part of the film, letting the exploration of the castle and their eccentricities take over the large portion of time here in the first half so they don't get really unleashed to knock people off until the later half. That it all for the better here, with the doll effects being quite substandard and really silly looking, barely featuring enough here to look like they're committing the crimes and just making it very obvious they're dolls. It's the biggest thing that holds this one back, alongside the bland pacing.
Rated R: Graphic Language and Graphic Violence.
