Touches You

It’s an especially fun movie from a director and cast who are clearly having a good time allowing themselves to let loose.

It's complicated... I really like the directing, acting and writing but, there are issues with the way it's shot that I just can't deny. As much as I love the storytelling and the fantastic performance but, there are also certain scenes that didn't need to exist.

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

This film follows directly on the first film, with a group of paranormal investigators setting up in the hotel. This installment has more atmosphere than the original and the action starts a lot sooner. It started off more interesting than the original film, but then quickly turned ridiculous. Andre Toulon is an annoying character, all bandaged and looking like a cross between Darkman and Michael Jackson. The film turns utterly weird towards the end as the characters are being killed off.

Part 2 is the classic Charles Band movie: cool premise wasted by cheap production and flat filmmaking. This sequel improves the villains from Part 1 (bringing us into a more Slasher setup) but everything else suffers. The setting is cheaper, the script is dumber and the actors are more comatose. The film has bright spots but they are wedged between painfully long filler scenes and bad soap opera acting. You see the beginning of the Full Moon formula for padding out movies with a handful of awesome moments with lots of nothingness. To its credit, PM2 is better shot and more entertaining than all of the sequels that followed. To many fans, PM2 is regarded as superior to the original because the standard DVD boxset release features a version that is sped up for cable. Watch the original and you will see its a drag-ass imitation of a much better film.

The second in Charles Band's incredibly long-running PUPPET MASTER series, following on from the distinctly average horror B-movie thrills of the original. PUPPET MASTER II features less of a story than the first; the story sees the evil toymaker Toulon brought back from the grave by his creepy puppets to hassle and harass a group of paranormal researchers from a US university.What this all boils down to is another series of gory murders perpetrated by the inimitable living puppets from the first film. Characters are drilled, slashed, and burned alive, and it's all handled with low rent aplomb by director David Allen. It's all complete nonsense of course, but fans of this sort of stuff will lap it up.PUPPET MASTER II does at least TRY to offer material of interest. There are some fun flashback scenes thrown into the mix, and given that the actor playing Toulon didn't come back for the sequel, the villain is dressed up as Claude Rains in THE INVISIBLE MAN and looks good. Inevitably the characters are all one-dimensional and the dialogue is poor enough that this would have been better as a silent film, but the plethora of low budget effects work is actually pretty decent, particularly the inventive climax with those ultra-creepy life-size dolls.

A group of paranormal researchers visit the late Andre Toulon's palatial hotel on top of the cliff overlooking Bodega Bay, coming in contact with the deceased German creator's killer dolls, unfortunate for them. Stop motion effects maestro David Allen got his chance to sit in the director's chair for PUPPETMASTER II, the decision making sense considering it's more or less an f/x movie. Nita Talbot(haha, nice homage to THE WOLF MAN) is Camille, a mystic hired to possibly spot what science can not..mostly she spouts psycho-babble and mumbo jumbo, but she comes in useful when it's time for dolls to execute folks. Elizabeth Maclellan is Carolyn Bramwell, head of the research team, her brother Patrick(Gregory Webb)along with students Lance(Jeff Celentano) and Wanda(Charlie Spradling) also part of this group hoping to discover some sort of paranormal activity. What they do not expect is a resurrected Toulon(Steve Welles), under the disguise of Eriquee Chaneé, wearing bandages to hide his hideous visage due to the deterioration of his corpse(a hat and black cape paying obvious homage to THE INVISIBLE MAN), claiming he owns the property for which they are conducting research. Toulon allows this because Carolyn reminds him of his wife, Elsa. Michael(Collin Bernsen), an author of westerns, is Camille's son and when he is told she has "disappeared", he comes to the hotel resort to seek her out, falling in love with Carolyn in the process. Meanwhile, the puppets, including a new one called Torch(a blow torch on it's arm sets victims on fire), decide to take up where they left off from the previous movie, killing people. Their brains are of interest to Toulon for he needs the human material for a serum which keeps the puppets active and alive(including himself), but eventually the creations are offended that the dolls' creator would choose to have his Elsa(Carolyn)in a human-sized marionette form(there's also a male marionette version for himself)than to keep them restored and living. Dave Allen's creations are the real highlight of the Puppetmaster series and I think that's why there have been so many movies since 1989. The drill-head doll shows up momentarily to burrow a hole in a victim's forehead. Hook also gets in on the fun, slicing and stabbing, but most of his damage is done off screen. George "Buck" Flower and Sage Allen have supporting parts as a couple putting up electrical barb wire around their cabin which doesn't do any good.