‘Dolly’ is a 2026 independent slasher/horror film released by Witchcraft Motion Picture Company, written & directed by Rod Blackhurst, and starring Fabianne Therese, Seann William Scott, Max the Impaler, and Ethan Suplee. The film follows a couple taking a hike out to a scenic outlook where the guy plans on proposing. Unfortunately, the day has some different plans for them as they find themselves wrapped into a baby doll riddled hellscape tucked away in the woods off the trail. I was honestly quite surprised with some of the names that popped up in this film. Not that Seann William Scott and Ethan Suplee are like the most notable A-list celebrities out there, but they’re known and they’re recognizable faces still, so it was kind of cool and wild to see them pop up in this independent slasher flick.
The story itself is pretty cool. I like that they kept it pretty simple, I mean of course they did because the budget was what it was, but the cast was small and the story really wasn’t hard to follow. It just had the vibe and feel of a classic slasher flick. A couple heads into the woods for a hike and a fun day, they run into some really weird and unsettling things, then shit really goes sideways. It gave me that classic laughable rage that only a slasher film can bring as well, the troupe of the extremely naive main characters that choose to completely ignore all the red flags in front of them and not GTFO while they have the chance to. Look, I get not causing a scene if you see A baby doll in the woods, like one, it would just be a little creepy right? But, if you see a plethora of baby dolls nailed to trees, sprawled throughout and into the woods themselves? I am getting the hell out of there! Propose at some other scenic spot, it’s not worth risking it for the biscuit in that instance! I guess I can’t complain that they ignored the clear signals though because if they didn’t then this wouldn’t even be a movie. The killer, Babygirl/Dolly, was a pretty neat new addition in the world of horror and one with potential for much more if they get a chance to make this a series. I know that’s always the thing with horror movies nowadays and people are kind of burnt on series and franchises. I love a good one-off horror movie as well, but this movie set itself up for potentially a lot more with this character that I’d like to see explored and I feel like they specifically could benefit from making at least 1 or 2 more films in this world because they’d have a lot more money and studio funding I’m sure if this one is a success.
The Dolly character gave reminiscent vibes to Leatherface. A hulking and domineering figure concealed under a mask that can literally rip people apart with their bare hands but seemingly comes from an even more twisted and effed up family. Like, Dolly was the dominant and in control character until one of her family members entered the equation and they sort of shrunk her and belittled her because she’s mute and inept, like Leatherface with the Sawyer/Hewitt clan. This movie in ways really felt like a mashup of ‘Barbarian’ and ‘The Texas Chainsaw Massacre’ and all of that had to do with Dolly. On top of the similarities to Leatherface, she also had an infatuation with mothering and treating her captives like babies, much like the ‘Mother’ figure in the Barbarian movie. That element of the story made for some super uncomfortable moments as well when it came to some of her mothering elements like feeding time and punishment for bad behavior and things like that. I won’t go into the gory details, you’ll see them if you watch it, but I think you can kind of let your mind wander just by my saying ‘feeding time’ and ‘punishment’ and you’ll probably get there eventually. Some of the visual elements in this movie were pretty great as well, specifically Dolly’s mask which was like a giant porcelain baby doll face that covered their entire head, and the house, Dolly’s evil little fortress of solitude. You didn’t get a full shot of the house that many times, but it was seemingly styled after and painted to look like a dilapidated dollhouse tucked away in the woods and it was just a really neat element that added even another layer to the character. That’s what I mean, with the look and the potential lore that could be explored with this character I hope they get the chance to do more with it. Even a prequel where we can kind of learn Dolly’s backstory and see more of that twisted familial element could be interesting. Sort of see what created the monster, I guess.
The small cast was great as well, no complaints really about any of them. I hadn’t heard of Fabianne Therese before, but she did great as sort of the main character here and she really drew the sympathy out of you as a viewer and moved the story forward through her experience. Seann William Scott is great too, I just think of him as a smarmy, slimy douche kind of character because that was basically the character he played in all the teen comedies he was in throughout the late 90s-2000s, so it was kind of neat to see him playing the loyal and endearing guy with a young daughter. Change of pace. The boy done grew up! Ethan Suplee had a smaller but intriguing role in here, giving his best ‘Otis’ from Rob Zombie’s Firefly Family films impersonation. At least that’s who he reminded me of pretty heavily. Just the evil intense energy the character had and even the way his hair and beard looked. Ethan Suplee’s body transformation is still absolutely incredible to me though, kudos to that guy. Of course, Max the Impaler as well who played Dolly and stole the show. Max is actually a nonbinary professional wrestler who wrestled for ROH and the NWA so that’s a pretty neat little crossing of my 2 worlds, horror and pro wrestling. I feel like their wrestling background definitely served them well here in the role of a silent killer in a slasher flick. It’s all about body movement and physical expression and that’s all what being a wrestler is about as well, selling the moves to the audience. Great choice for the character and pretty neat that a wrestler got a role in a movie like this as well.
I don’t really have a lot of bad to say here honestly. Not that this movie was perfect or anything, but I really enjoyed it. The “problems” can honestly just be equated to lack of budget and funding in part. If you don’t like slasher movies or like backwoods/hillbilly horror, then this probably wouldn’t be for you but that’s pretty much self-explanatory based on my breakdown of the movie already. There are some of the classic, some could say worn out, troupes that are silly but also help to make a slasher film what it is in here but that didn’t really bother me. I kind of liked that they stayed to the formula and kept it simple in ways like I said, it helped make it feel a bit like a classic in the modern day. That’ll just about wrap this one up though I think folks! Thank you so much for checking this out and reading along. Make sure to like the page on social media if that’s how you got here or come back to the website often to read along with my new weekly content over horror films (new & classic), WWE, newly released movies, NFL, and more! Thank you and until next time, be good to one another!
