‘Evil Little Things’ Review
Stars: Cory Anderson, Yasmin Bakhtiari, Demetrice Byrd, Piper Collins, Peyton J. Evans, Hannah Fierman, Zach Galligan, Courtney Hogan, Jonathan Horne, Courtney Lakin | Written by Yasmin Bakhtiari, Nancy Knight | Directed by Matt Green
I am a big big fan of anthology horror movies. Giving directors some freedom for a short amount of time and coming up with a story that links them all can often create some really entertaining films.
I’ve mentioned “anthology horror” immediately because you might not realise Evil Little Things is an anthology while watching it. I certainly didn’t know going into but what we get is two movies of about 35 or 40 minutes and one that is about 3 minutes. Although that final short short is closely connected to the frame narrative that links everything together. That being a toy shop owner telling stories about the toys he is trying to sell. But if you don’t know that this is more than one movie, it can be quite confusing as you expect the movies to be linked in some other way (they are not).
Story one is ‘Blood For Gold’. The story of a leprechaun who is out to kill a woman who witnessed it as a child. The script is really poorly written here. Even my low horror movie standards were pushed here as I was constantly thinking ‘why are you doing that’ and ‘why don’t you just’, especially with the lead character. She makes stupid decisions again and again after finding a leprechaun doll on her doorstep. The only entertainment that comes from this short is when the leprechaun finally comes to laugh and tries to kill. It’s still bad but it’s ridiculous and briefly fun in a so bad it’s good kind of way. Young actress Piper Collins is the only person who the script doesn’t completely destroy and she shows some potential.
Story two is ‘Be Careful What You Wish For’. A woman, Evangeline, is waiting for a delivery of her latest doll before she heads to a sci-fi convention with that and some other dolls. One of them being ‘Paddy’, whose accent I couldn’t quite work out but she is Evangeline’s favourite and also one of those killer dolls. This short does show some potential (try to ignore the make-up effects) when it focuses on the lead characters mental state rather than the killer doll. There’s a hint of a good,original story there and Courtney Lankin as Evangeline is pretty good when the material she is given is decent. But it too often wants to be an obvious and generic killer doll horror movie and even if ‘Paddy’ does look kind of cool by the end, it’s still pretty poor.
Just when you think the movie has ended story number three starts. ‘Clown’ is unsurprisingly a clown doll bought home by a little boy whose step-dad is eager to teach a lesson with his belt. This is only notable because that step-dad is played by none other than Zach Galligan of Gremlins fame. But even her can’t save it.
There are so many good horror anthology movies that it’s hard to recommend one that has a mess of a script, can’t decide if it wants to be a full feature or not and is generally just plain bad.
