Stometer Save your money for something good and enjoyable

Majorthebys Charming and brutal

WillSushyMedia This movie was so-so. It had it's moments, but wasn't the greatest.

Lela The tone of this movie is interesting -- the stakes are both dramatic and high, but it's balanced with a lot of fun, tongue and cheek dialogue.

TheCinephiliacs After recently revisiting the 1987 killer doll flick "Dolls" I had the urge to check out some other similar movies and while deciding which one to go for I came across this new Blu-ray release from 88 Films of the 1992 cult classic, Demonic Toys.Written by Stephen S. Goyer, who would go on to write the stories for the massively successful Batman Begins, The Dark Knight and The Dark Knight Rises and based on an original idea from Charles Band who was also a producer here. Band is well known for writing the Puppet Master movies as well as directing low budget cult fare like Evil Bong, Doll Graveyard, The Gingerdead Man and Trancers. Peter Manoogian (Arena, Enemy Territory) was behind the camera as director, and the trifecta of these three minds would create a horror film that has become a cult classic in the twenty two years since its release.Taking a great amount of inspiration and ideas from Puppet Master, which even plays on a television in the background of a scene in the film, Demonic Toys is a simple premise that is effective enough to drive its point home and provide an entertaining, though thoroughly clichéd, romp of bloody 90's silliness. The film opens with four characters meeting in a dark parking lot to buy and sell some illegal firearms, but two of the characters turn out to be undercover police officers and the deal turns sour, with one police officer being shot dead as the criminals escape into a nearby warehouse and the second police officer, Judith Gray (Tracy Scoggins), giving chase. The warehouse is where we spend most of the movie, which is pretty convenient considering the warehouse in question houses evil spirits and a butt-load of creepy looking toys. We are soon joined by some other characters in our story of malevolent plastic organisms. The lazy warehouse security guard, Charnetski (Peter Schrum), a fast-food delivery guy called Mark (Bently Mitchum) and a homeless runaway called Anne (Ellen Dunning). With one of the fleeing criminals wounded, and the other, Lincoln (Michael Russo) finally caught and handcuffed by Judith, the insanity finally begins. With possession, a creepy kid with a male adult voice, a sharp toothed bear doll and a Jack-in-a-box who will eat your face off while laughing, Demonic Toys isn't afraid to be absurd, and that's why it is still charming to watch.It isn't a ground breaking film, and it can be a little banal at times, but it is charming and the scenes in which the toys are attacking their human victims are fun, gory and humorous. They don't make films like this nowadays and so it is fun to go back and watch them. The music, drenched in synthesized keyboard sounds, is what you'd expect from a film like this at the time it was made, and the special effects, though fine, are nothing special and could have benefited from being crazier and more extreme. I didn't mind the fact that the film takes place, all but for a couple of scenes, in one place, but it would have been nice if there had been some diversity to the areas of the warehouse as a way to make it more interesting to look at. Still, Demonic Toys is what it is, a low budget and pedestrian horror film that, through its fun puppetry and stop-frame animation and silly scenes of evil doll attacks, is memorable and enjoyable.The look of the film on this specific Blu-ray edition from 88 Films is very nice. It's clear and the sound, though not perfect, is fine. The colours are as vibrant as they can be considering the black and grey setting and the cover-art, though not necessarily relevant to the film quality, is nice and eye catching, which should help it sell some copies to people who are unfamiliar with it. The special features are pretty damn poor, with only an original trailer and a featurette from the old VHS release being the only Demonic Toys specific features on the disc. A retrospective, a commentary or even an introduction from Band, or someone who worked on the film, would have been nice. Still, the film was enjoyable, but then again I do like these sorts of b-movies from the 80's and 90's. For those who aren't familiar with the genre and are expecting something fantastically exciting, perhaps this might not tick their boxes

BA_Harrison The front cover of my DVD for Demonic Toys (Film 2000 Shock Horror Collection) states that 'special effects wizard David Allen brings Toulon's killer puppets magically to life'. In reality, Allen's FX contribution is fairly negligible and Toulon (from the Puppetmaster series) has jack all to do with this particular movie.Similarly misleading is the one (mis)quote on the sleeve from roberthood.net (no, me neither), which describes Demonic Toys as boasting 'breast-focused nudity', which it doesn't really: there's a two second shot of a topless woman—hardly what you would call Russ Meyer/Andy Sidaris territory.Despite the distributor clearly feeling the need to deceive people into buying the film, Demonic Toys isn't all that awful; in fact, as trashy low-budget B-movie horrors go, this one is actually pretty entertaining, with a reasonable amount of invention (the script written by David S. Goyer of Batman Begins and Dark City fame), some marvellously shonky puppet-style monsters, and a fair amount of gratuitous gore (including plucked eyeballs and a decapitation).It's all incredibly silly, of course, with people trapped in a toy warehouse, terrorised by a demonic jack-in-the-box, a deadly doll called Oopsie Daisy, and a giant killer teddy bear (controlled by an evil spirit who wants to be reborn as a human), but not so bad that it didn't deserve a respectable DVD release with a more representative sleeve.5.5 out of 10, rounded up to 6 for IMDb.

Woodyanders An evil 66-year-old boy spirit (a creepy portrayal by Daniel Cerny) with the power to bring toys to life gets awakened and searches for a new body to inhabit. Tough lady cop Judith Gray (a pleasingly feisty performance by the stunning Tracy Scoggins) and several others find themselves trapped in a warehouse with the pernicious brat. Director Peter Manoogian, working from a compact and engrossing script by David S. Goyer, relates the absorbing story at a steady pace, stages the action and attack set pieces with real skill and aplomb, treats the absurd premise with admirable seriousness, delivers a handy helping of graphic gore, and further spruces things up with a very nasty sense of wickedly amusing black humor. The solid acting by the competent cast helps a lot, with especially praiseworthy work from Bentley Mitchum as sarcastic slacker fast food delivery guy Mark Wayne, Michael Russo as ruthless scumbag criminal Lincoln, Ellen Dunning as scrappy teenage runaway Anne, and Peter Schrum as grumpy security guard Charnetski. The nifty array of killer toys adds immensely to the twisted entertainment value: a giant teddy bear (!), a robot, a jack in the box, and a foul-mouthed baby doll. Busty blonde babe Kristine Rose provides some skin as hot pin-up Miss July. Adlfo Bartoli's impressively polished cinematography makes fine use of a smoothly gliding Steadicam, boasts lots of cool tilted camera angles, and even offers a little stylized slow motion. Richard Band's shivery score does the spine-tingling trick. A really fun piece of blithely trashy junk.

Scarecrow-88 "The world is a toilet and all the people in it are a**holes." Silly nonsense from Full Moon based on an original story by executive producer Charles Band. More toys that kill people, this time in a warehouse with a group of unfortunates who happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Tracy Scoggins stars as a tough cop whose boyfriend/partner gets shot in the line of duty during a gun-smuggling shake-down that goes awry; she is pregnant with his unborn child. The two crooks responsible for his murder run for a warehouse holding Arcadia toys, while Scoggins is in hot pursuit. A dead demon fetus was buried in the ground underneath the warehouse, 66 years a demonic spirit awaiting its chance to occupy the human fetus of Scoggins' Judith Gray. Blood from the bullet wound of one of the criminals seeps into a crack in the floor of the warehouse (the cracks in the floor form a pentagram, a pretty creative visual I must say) bringing new life to the demonic spirit which possesses several toys (including a Baby Oopsy-Daisey doll, jack in the box, robot, and teddy bear), using them as weapons for destruction.Bentley Mitchum is a chicken delivery man, miserable with his job, whose life gets even worse when he's trapped in the warehouse, defending himself against killer dolls. Michael Russo is one of the punks, smart mouth and vile personality, who Scoggins chases into the warehouse, causing all kinds of mischief and trouble for our heroine. Daniel Cerny is the creepy kid whose form is used the most by the demonic spirit to antagonize Scoggins. Other characters include an obese security guard and a runaway using the warehouse as a place to rest. Jeff Celentano (Puppetmaster II) has a brief, but important, part as Scoggins' slain lover whose appearance the demon uses to torment Judith, including one ghoulish scene where he removes his eyes from their sockets."Demonic Toys" is as preposterous as the synopsis sounds, but does have some positive aspects such as a beautifully melodic score by Richard Band and super stop motion animation toy soldier sequences by the late, great David Allen and his crew. Lots of icky gore has the demonic toys chewing heartily into the faces and throats of victims, pulling away flesh with their monstrous teeth. If you ever wanted to unload bullets into toys, then the final scene where Scoggins and Mitchum blast away at the "demon's army" should produce a vicarious thrill. Scoggins acts her heart out, particularly when confronted by the demon's use of her lover's dead corpse for kicks, but maybe she goes a little bit over the top with the melodramatics. Yep, this movie has a scene where characters use ventilation ducts in an attempt to escape and get help. Most memorable death scene could be the vicious murder of the warehouse security guard who even gets stabbed in the crotch by Baby Oopsy-Daisey. Oh, speaking of Baby Oopsy-Daisey, the baby doll toy spouts out curse words and profane quips ala Chucky. The killer toys are noticeably hand puppets during close-up scenes. You even have poor Mitchum up against a man in a bear suit for good measure. Hokum of the highest order, but I have to admit those toys are rather imposing, particularly with the addition of those sharp teeth and demonic eyes.