On the Doll

A larded use of content considered taboo and shocking by the general populace with plenty of oddly written dialog coming at you wrapped in artistic pretension. On The Doll serves to exploit a serious issue. Pedophilia, molesters, right along side with their abused children are all here on the plate as entertainment. Though the editing is well executed its the opposite of being a '"star vehicle" for Brittany Snow. The other actors give us their best student like performances. Yes, this film is terrible but not in the fun way. The end leaves one wondering what is the exact personal problem(s)of writer/director Thomas Mignone to take such an interest here.

This movie basically tries to expose the "dark side" of the sex industry, but it does so in a decidedly PG-13 and completely (and at times laughably) implausible manner.

There are three interweaving stories here. One involves a young adult sex abuse survivor named "Jizz" who works at a print sex magazine because he is trying to buy the freedom of a physically crippled childhood friend who works in a peep show booth. Even assuming there are any peep shows still around, it's pretty hard to believe that in Hollywood--a town full of struggling, adult actresses--they would have to resort to keeping a physically disabled sex slave, who never actually seems to take off her clothes. Anyway, "Jizz" gets together with another prostitute (Brittany Snow), who also never takes off her clothes and doesn't seem to have to do anything more degrading than tie up a john and punch him in the gonads. It's not COMPLETELY unbelievable that some pervert would pay a girl hundreds of dollars to tie him up and punch him in the nuts, but this idiot also happens to be a mob "bag man" who's carrying thousands of dollars with him at the time!

Another story involves two "high school" girls who are both implausibly mature-looking and unbelievably naive and stupid. They get preyed upon by a ridiculously evil teacher (if this guy had a moustache he'd be twirling it). A real teacher these days would probably be fired for even having two students in his car, yet we're supposed to believe this guy can drive female students to porn shoots, masturbate in the street while they flash their panties, feed them drugs, and worse, yet they can't tell their parents, the cops, or their fricking school principal because "no one will believe" them. The only halfway believable story involves a young couple trying to save up money for marriage. She's another prostitute who apparently never has to take off her clothes or perform actual sex acts, and he's her pimp/driver.

There's nothing wrong with condemning the modern-day sex industry; it's just that nothing in this film remotely resembles the REAL-LIFE modern day sex industry. And I know that having a lot of sex and nudity might have made this film kind of hypocritical given the dim view it takes on the sex trade, but it also might have made it slightly less boring and worthless. The PG-13 content is just one more element that serves to make this movie the steaming crock of laughable bullsh*t that it is.

I love this site. I usually pay a lot of attention to the scores before I watch a movie. In this case I am glad I didn't pay attention.

I watch a lot of independent films, but i don't pay attention to who made what who starred in what. I just don't care. I just watch and enjoy. I wasn't good at book reviews when i was a kid, and nothings changed but here goes...

I think the low votes must be from people who found the movie too shocking. Or people who couldn't empathize or want to empathize with the characters. It is not necessarily graphic or vulgar. Its not even that dark. Its just unique. It is just the right mix of real life drama/Hollywood.

All I can say is watch this movie. And if you are better than me at giving reviews then do everyone else a favor and clue them in.

In Los Angeles, Jaron "Jizz" (Josh Janowicz) is a needy teenager that was molested when he was a child and works publishing advertisements for the sex industry. He discounts one hundred dollars in his paychecks to release Tara (Angela Sarafyan), who works in a peep cabin in Paulie's, for the powerful lord of the sex industry Jimmy Sours (Paul Ben-Victor). He teams-up with the whore Balery (Brittany Snow), who is seeking out a partner to steal a rich client, to raise the necessary money to pay Jimmy. Mr. Garrett (Eddie Jemison) is the perverted Health teacher of a high-school; his sluttish students Melody (Candice Accola) and Courtney (Chloe Dumont) like to tease him, crossing their legs while wearing mini-skirts to see him masturbating in his car. Mr. Garrett takes them to join the Internet porn industry and to use pills, and Melody is raped by the sick teacher. The escort Chantel (Shanna Collins) attends kinky clients to satisfy their fantasies and is protected by her pimp Wes (Clayne Crawford). When Wes tries to force the entry in a client's house, the man reacts and the lives of the lead characters are entwined in a tragedy.

"On the Doll" is a dark movie with a confused screenplay that recalls the style of "Crash" about perversions and sex industry that ends in tragedies. The characters in general are poorly developed like, for example, Tara. Is she the girl from Jaron's dream that felt off the roof on the sidewalk? The sympathetic Jaron is under therapy learning to take care of himself and his characters is reasonably developed. Mel and Courtney provoked the situation with their teacher acting like sluts. And Chantel and Wes are the less interesting characters. It is great to see Theresa Russell still very beautiful and elegant since I am a fan of this underrated actress. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "Prazeres Proibidos" ("Forbidden Pleasures")

Just saw the film and still can't make my mind about it.

while it seems to raise a painful picture of sexual deviancy, and its effect on the main characters it's not deep enough to make the point it tries to make. The main visual representation of the idea is a misfired bullet from a gun (phallic symbol, no doubt) that lands with unforeseen result and causing mayhem, looks a bit student-like, and makes the film seem manipulated and even shallow. However, being an important subject, illustrating modern western moral decay through sexual decadence is an important one, it has some redeeming values. However, that massage as portrayed is quite coarse and unrefined. On top of that the acting is pretty bad all around. This looks like a pretty good student film that deals with an important subject, and I hope it's makers move on to better scripts. On the whole I would say that it is worth watching but not the best of it's kind.