1.5/5 stars
Making a horror film without any shocks is like making a sex comedy in which everyone keeps their clothes on – what’s the point? But the trend, of which Brahms: The Boy II is the latest incarnation, has become increasingly prevalent over the last decade, the result of a marketing decision by American studios to try to sell horror to those who are too young to get into a US “R” rated film.
The results, as with this subpar offering, are usually full of build-ups with no pay-offs, something which leaves horror-hungry viewers feeling continually short-changed.
This is the stand-alone follow-up to 2016’s The Boy, a film so forgettable that this writer had completely forgotten he had actually watched it. Some deep thinking recalled that it was very dull indeed. Brahms: The Boy II, the product of the same director, William Brent Bell, and the same scriptwriter, Stacey Menear, may be even duller.
After he sees his mother Liza (Katie Holmes) being violently attacked by a burglar, young Jude (Christopher Convery) is traumatised, and loses the power to speak.
Months later the family, which includes dad Sean (Owain Yeoman), decide to temporarily move into a gloomy mansion in the British countryside to try and recover from the robbery.
While out walking in the woods, Jude discovers a spooky child-size porcelain doll buried in the ground. Jude names the doll Brahms and takes it home, where mum and dad are pleased that it seems to cheer him up. But then Jude starts to act creepily towards his parents, and Liza begins to suspect the doll may be alive.
Most of the budget seem to have gone on Holmes’ salary, as Brahms may have the least special effects of any horror film ever made. The devilish doll is never called on to move, and the director sits him in different chairs throughout the film. This obviously does not lead to any shocks. Even during a fight scene, the doll is simply carried around by the other characters and dumped in a (small) fire.
Holmes has often lamented that she doesn’t get offered decent roles, and this continues the trend. But the actress is a cut above the inexperienced talent that usually populates such horrors, and does her best to turn in a decent performance.
Convery, who plays the young son, looks like he has been forced to watch endless reruns of The Omen to prepare for his role – he wears the same suit and has the same floppy hair as the evil Damien – and is convincing as the traumatised child.
The rest of the cast just about manage to out-act the porcelain doll.
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