Wow, first review for this film since 2004. Having seen the film, somehow that doesn't surprise me.
Voodoo Dolls is a little-seen Canadian mish-mash of voodoo, ghosts, possession, haunted plays and lesbianism. Now, I know what you're thinking already. That sounds awesome, right? Don't get your hopes up just yet, as even though the film does contain all of those elements, none of them seem to have anything to do with each other.
Trying to decipher the plot of the film can give the viewer a headache of epic proportions. The film begins with a black-and-white flashback of a student of an all-girl school killing the headmaster and two students he was sleeping with, and then moves forward to the present, where Vanessa Forbes is enrolling in that same school. Almost immediately, weird things start to happen to Vanessa; she sees ghostly girls playing with big red bouncy balls, her belongings fall off of her dorm's counters, and people are getting hurt and killed all around her. What could be causing all of these odd happenings? Truth is, I have no idea. There are plot-lines for about seven movies in Voodoo Dolls, none of which are fleshed out and none of which make any sense. It's hinted that the ghosts from the flashback are haunting the school, but there's also some half-assed voodoo sub-plot, in which a black man in face-paint who may or may not work at the school beats on drums and chants while surrounded by vaguely African-looking props. There's also figures that kind of look like Troll dolls that are found in students' rooms and randomly savagely kill a perverted school employee. Oh, and don't forget the "creepy" play that the school is putting on that also might be awakening some sort of spirit. I don't know which one of these is supposed to be causing the strangeness, or if they're all interrelated. Honestly have no clue.
They also squeeze in all of that convoluted nonsense in the last 40 minutes of the movie, after making you watch 45 minutes of what basically amounts to a soap opera. Girls walk around, go on dates, fantasize about the dreamy leader of the school, and participate in PG-13 rated lesbian activities. Plus, these actors and actresses are almost legendarily bad (there's a scene with the black man reprimanding the pervert which may just have the most stilted dialogue reading of all time), the music rarely ever matches up with the scene at hand and is usually strange Southern blues-rock, and the lesbian scenes barely have any nudity. Put all these elements together, and you've got a pretty insufferable half of a movie.
And even after we get to the interesting parts, it's still god-awful. The special effects are about as bad as effects can get; case in point, when a girl slits her wrist, there's no wound or prosthetic at all, there's just some blood-red liquid splattered on her arm. That's how it is for every death in the movie, and it seems as if the entirety of their special effects budget went to buying something that was red and would stay on actors' skin. The final scene's effects literally have to be seen to be believed; they're that bad.
Voodoo Dolls really does nothing at all right, and unfortunately it's not even fun to watch. I know I said two sentences ago that the final scene had to be seen to be believed, but it's not worth it. A couple laughably bad lines (see title of review) and some of the worst acting ever recorded on film provide a few laugh-out-loud moments, but these can't even come close to salvaging this monstrosity. Watching Voodoo Dolls is 90 minutes of your life that you will never get back, and your existence will become worse by watching it. Do like everyone else, and forget this even exists.
