Review #123: Bride of Chucky (1998)

Cast/Notable Credits:
Ronny Yu (Director): Freddy vs. Jason

Brad Dourif (Chucky):

Jennifer Tilly (Tiffany): Seed of Chucky, Bound (1996), Liar Liar (1997), Monsters, Inc. (2001)

Katherine Heigl (Jade): Bug Buster (1998), Valentine, Knocked Up (2007), Roswell & Grey's Anatomy T.V. series

Nick Stabile (Jesse): Sunset Beach, Passions, Saints & Sinners T.V. series

Alexis Arquette (Damien): Children of the Corn 5 (1998), Lords of Dogtown (2005)

John Ritter (Chief Kincaid): Problem Child 1 (1990) & 2 (1991), It (1990), Bad Santa (2003), Three's Company & 8 Simple Rules...Teenage Daughter T.V. series

Gordon Michael Woodvet (David): Andromeda T.V. series

Janet Kidder (Diane): Ginger Snaps 2 (2004)

Lawrence Dane (Lt. Preston): Scanners (1981), Darkman 2 (1994)

Vince Corazza (Bailey): Urban Legend

Trailer:


Plot:

Chucky's former girlfriend, Tiffany, tracks down the Good Guys Doll that possesses the trapped soul of Charles Lee Ray. Tiffany patches the doll up with parts from other dolls and then practices some Black Magic on her own to bring the smart *ss killer doll back to life...along with the help of the book, "Voodoo for Dummies". Tiffany's sole intention of bringing Chucky back to life is to marrying him.

Unfortunately, Chucky does share Tiffany's dream and ends up p*ssing her off which leads to her locking Chucky up in a play pen. The clever little killer doll escapes and then kills Tiffany and performs some Black Magic of his own on her, transferring her soul into a female plastic doll.

The only way out for the two of them is to obtain The Heart of Damballa amulet which Chucky wore around his neck before he died. The amulet lays to rest with the buried corpse of Charles Lee Ray at the Forest Hills Cemetery in Hackensack, New Jersey.

To get to New Jersey, Tiffany pays her unsuspecting neighbor, Jesse, to deliver two dolls to a friend of hers in New Jersey. Jesse agrees and arrives the next morning to pick up the two killer dolls. Before departure, Jesse drives to his girlfriends house to rescue her from her (Jade) controlling uncle who is also chief of police.

The two love birds flee the town in a van with Chucky and Tiffany in stow. Along the way, mysterious deaths happen which allows the Jesse and Jade to suspect one another as the killer of the mysterious deaths. Conflicted, the two flee the searching police on their way to New Jersey.

Villain:

Double the pleasure, double the fun...two killer dolls! Of course, Chucky stars in the film. Unlike the previous movies, instead of a shiny new plastic doll body, Chucky has the make-up of a Frankenstein looking doll with patch stitching through out the body.

Speaking of Chucky, in the NFL, a young head coach of the Raiders, John Gruden starts to get comparisons with the killer doll. Gruden has that disgruntled, scowl look on his baby face. Check 'em out! Pictured right.

Tagging along with Chucky is Tiffany, his former girlfriend. After a serious of events, she becomes a tiny little female doll with a kick *ss biker chick make-over. Tiffany craves killing people, but her true passion is the love of Chucky. Ah, how sweet.

Cast:

Leading the cast are Katherine Heigl (Jade) and Nick Stabile (Jesse). Heigl plays a pretty good female lead in the film, but for me, a lot of that credit goes to the fact that she is entirely gorgeous. It hampers me to look past that fact and really break down her actual performance.

Stabile plays Heigl's boyfriend in the film. He is the strong lead male character and pulled it off pretty well. Unlike some douche bags that have played lead male roles, I actually liked Stabile in this role. He did not come off too cocky, or jockey. He was actually a likable lead dude.

Other cast members include the late John Ritter as Jade's prick uncle, Chief Kincaid. Ritter's performance was substandard of what he's capable of. I never felt that he was mean enough in the film. He was just another father who abused his power as chief of police to spy and control his niece.

SFX/Gore:

Bride of Chucky gives us a pretty good body count at eleven. I could tell they made an effort to give us some fresh looking kills as Chucky and Tiffany battled through out the movie trying to out do one another.

My favorite kill: * Highlight to Read * Jesse and Jade's friend David, was in the back of their van when he stumbles across the hidden dead body of Chief Kincaid. He freaks out and backs out of the van with the Chief's gun pulled at them. Chucky and Tiffany come to life and pull guns on David. David panics and backs out in the follow of traffic and BAM! David is hit by a semi truck. * End.

TNA:

There are two key members of the TNA club in this movie, Heigl and Tilly. I have to admit, Tilly looks smokin' sexy in a trimmed down, younger version of herself. It's too bad she couldn't keep that figure.

On to Heigl...she's hot! Enough said. Pictured Below.


On a couple side notes, first one...if I was into dolls...that's a big IF, the Tiffany doll looked pretty good. Tiffany was a styling, smokin' hot goth/biker/bride looking doll. My second side note, it was great to see Chucky and Tiffany "get it on" in the movie. That's f*ckin' awesome! How many times are you gonna see plastic dolls bumping elbows and grinding it out? Yeah, that's what I thought.

Concept:

For some reason, Child's Play 3 is generally disliked, and it caused the franchise to be put on the back burner for a few years. But it returns with vengeance in Bride of Chucky! First of all, I give tremendous props for the idea of bringing the Tiffany doll into the series. What a brilliant move! Give Chucky a partner in crime and a love interest. We could almost call this a "Chick flick".

Okay...maybe not.

Secondly, they buried the hatchet on the Andy Barclay story. It's not that I hated Andy, but sometimes to revive a franchise, you gotta move on into a new direction. This move opened up the door for the Heart of Damballa Amulet. Chucky could use it to come back to life. So...why didn't he crave this the previous Child's Play movies? Oh well, it makes a fresher start for this one.

Finally, with the exit of Andy and Chucky's obsession with him, Bride of Chucky opens up the door for Chucky to do his best...kill. No more hiding and playing it cautiously...okay, he did that a little bit...but Chucky goes after people to kill.

T.Gun Factor:

I loved this movie. It was a nice homecoming party for the Child's Play franchise. Sure it had some continuity issues, but so do all the numerous sequels. Bride of Chucky is a dark comedy, but it was a fun enjoyable movie to watch.

Now...a small little rant...Why isn't this called Child's Play 4? That's one huge complaint I have with the 90's horror movies. What happened to Part X? Now the titles have some special tone to it. Nightmare 6 is Freddy's Dead: The Final Nightmare, and Friday 9 is Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday (I actually understand that one with the switching of studios), but Bride of Chucky? Was it a better marketing thing? Does that have a better ring to it than Child's Play 4?

Misc. Movie Trivia:
-Film opened on October 16, 1998 and made $32.3 million at the Box Office ($11.8 opening weekend)

-Julia Stiles won the role of Jade; turned down to do "10 Things I Hate About You"

-Nick Stabile: born in Wheatridge, CO; attended Colorado State University

-John Ritter died on September 11, 2001; six days before his 55th birthday

-Janet Kidder is the niece of Margot Kidder (Lois Lane from 80's Superman movies)

-Many classic horror movie references hidden in film: Bride of Frankenstein (Playing on TV), Hellraiser (death looks like Pinhead), Omen (Character Damien Baylock: Damien & evil nanny Miss Baylock), Evidence room at beginning: Halloween & Friday the 13th (Masks), Texas Chainsaw Massacre (Leatherface's chainsaw), A Nightmare on Elm Street (Freddy glove), Puppet Master (Evil puppets), Creepshow (crate)