Review: Brahms: The Boy II

PLOT: After a traumatic experience, parents Liza and Sean decide to rent a guest home for their family to get away from the city. Once there, their son Josh discovers a creepily familar life-like doll while on a walk in the woods. Once the doll becomes part of the family, strange things begin to occur.

REVIEW: There are two shots that are sort of creepy in BRAHMS: THE BOY II. Both of these images appear during the opening sequence regarding a shadow standing behind a staircase. Now we’re not talking about scenes, just simply shots. The rest of the movie however runs the gamut between stupendously boring to utterly ridiculous back to straight up boring again. While the original film certainly didn’t have critics cheering, this lifeless and dull sequel is just as devoid of emotion or scares as the doll they call Brahms. This isn’t horror. This is just horrible. Even with a decent cast that includes Katie Holmes, Owain Yeoman, Ralph Ineson and young Christopher Convery, this silly sequel will probably only muster a yawn from an audience willing to take it all in.

While her husband is once again working late (three times this week guys!!!), Liza (Holmes) and her son Jude (Convery) have a terrifying late night experience. After robbers knock her unconscious and tidily leave right after, she and her boy are pretty shaken up. In an attempt to properly handle the trauma they went through – including a child who now refuses to speak – her husband Sean (Yeoman) rents a guest home in the middle of nowhere. Once they arrive, they find it to be very close to a familiar setting, a beautiful guest house not far from the good old Heelshire family home. While on a walk, Jude discovers a doll that has been buried in the dirt. They bring the thing home, and soon Jude starts acting even more strange than he was after the attack. Is the doll alive and trying to possess the child? Frankly, it’s really hard to care at all.

We all know that a ton of bad horror flicks tend to come out early in the year. This year, while we actually have a couple of solid ones, we’ve also seen a few that are just really terrible. BRAHMS may be the worst so far and that’s a pretty big accomplishment. Aside from the two shots I mentioned, the William Brent Ball directed sequel – he and writer Stacey Menear are the ones responsible for the original as well – is so far from anything remotely scary that it’s really tiring to sit through. The attempted “scares” are few and far between and simply don’t work. The doll itself fails to even remotely generate any kind of thrill or chill. And the story revolving around this family is painfully cliched, without taking a single chance or trying anything new.

It’s really a shame that the script takes such an obvious and tiring route. Frankly, it did no favors to any of the performances. Holmes isn’t bad at all. In fact, she tries really hard to make this a likable character. Unfortunately for her all that she is given to do is ludicrous and dumb. Considering she is going through PTSD after the attack at her home, she spends much of her time having nightmares and making poor decisions revolving her son. And of course the husband is clueless and does little to help. Again, this is not the fault of Yeoman. The actor is fine with what little he is given, but it’s difficult to make anything even remotely interesting with a script this weak.

MINOR SPOILER ALERT: Another odd take is just how safe they take the horror aspect. This follows a bland and very predictable path. It’s especially obvious when some of Sean’s family arrives out of nowhere midway through the film, because you know, you need someone to get killed right?  RIGHT??? But wait, we don’t even get that – and yes it’s obvious they are going to take a safe route with this as well. This entire section attempts to inject a bit of fear and suspense, but all it actually offers is an obvious and massively disappointing horror trope. With so much of the focus on the three main characters, and one weird groundskeeper played by Ralph Ineson, their inclusion merely feels like an attempt to stretch an already thin story out. And don’t even get me started on why and how Groundskeeper Willy… I mean Groundskeeper Joseph is involved in this mess. END SPOILER ALERT.

BRAHMS: THE BOY 2 hits all the wrong notes. This boring sequel has no suspense at all. It’s exactly what you’d fear when watching a bad PG-13 horror feature. While the actors desperately try to make something out of nothing, it’s so terribly predictable and silly that audiences are more likely to have an occasional quiet chuckle than a scream – perhaps a more honest response is repeated yawning. It’s not even so bad it’s funny. No, this is just really bad. The fact that this has a theatrical release is the only surprise that this flick has to offer. There have been many scary doll movies, and this isn’t one of them. The only thing really terrifying is how much money myself and each of the five audience members I was with spent on their ticket. If you must, wait for Netflix because then you can easily watch something else once you get bored.