She’s less Chucky, more Brat●
Allison Williams has a knack for playing it straight. She brings a convincing realism to the most preposterous situations, or maybe she’s just an actor with limited range. Whatever the reason, it works, especially in the tricky genre where comedy meets horror. She excelled in a critical role in Get Out, and now in M3gan, a ludicrous, derivative and irresistible killer-doll movie.
Williams plays Gemma, a robotics engineer with no maternal instincts who suddenly must take care of her young niece, Cady (Violet McGraw), after a car accident turned her into an orphan. The synthetic skin of this movie is about how Gemma learns to take care of a child. Thankfully, its bloody heart is far sillier. It’s the comedy of a primly composed mean-girl android turning into a Terminator.
This is the kind of scary movie that needs a lead performance that is strong, not fragile, deadpan, not showy. Williams capably updates the mad-scientist archetype, refusing to pause and ask questions while inventing a doll of the future, one that pairs with a child and adjusts to their needs, filling in as best friend and big sister. Gemma uses Cady as her test case.
In a headier movie, there might be some misdirection. But M3gan (Amie Donald) is clearly pure evil from the start. She’s a great heavy: stylish, archly wry, intensely watchful. Her wanton violence never gets graphic enough to lose a PG-13 rating. In early January, when prestige holiday fare tends to give way to trashier pleasures, a good monster and a sense of humour can be enough. This movie has both, and it makes up for a slow start, some absurd dialogue (“You didn’t code in parental controls?”) and a by-the-book conclusion.
While the trailer invited comparisons to Child’s Play, the slasher film featuring the doll Chucky, that movie had a much grimier, disreputable undercurrent before the sequels and reboots turned goofy. M3gan moves with a lighter touch. There’s a scene where a police officer who is investigating the disappearance of a dog blurts out a chuckle, then apologises, saying: “I shouldn’t have laughed.”
I would have preferred a handful more guilty guffaws, although there are a few, including one when M3gan treats a real bully like a doll, with disposable parts. But the tone here sticks to just enough camp to keep the crowd smirking.
Director Gerard Johnstone doesn’t go for elaborate suspense sequences or truly intense scares. He wants to please, not rattle. And while there are some hints at social commentary on how modern mothers and fathers use technology to outsource parenting, this movie is smart enough to never take itself too seriously.
It’s helped by comic Ronny Chieng playing Gemma’s boss, a forever annoyed toy manufacturer who, at a rare moment of contentment, trashtalks Hasbro. Any horror fan knows that his jerkiness is as much a sign of impending doom as coeds having sex at a summer camp. When the moment arrives, it does not disappoint. M3gan struts, cartwheels, dances, makes no sense at all. What a doll.