Married-types Liza (Katie Holmes) and Sean (Owain Yeoman) beat a hasty retreat to the countryside in an attempt to forget a robbery dealio that L-Dawg experienced in the city that left her shook A.F.
As fate and the script wound have it, their crotch-goblin Jude (Christopher Convery) discovers a creepy-ass doll in the woods and brings that putrid, porcelain fuck right the fuck home… and guess what? That terrible toy seems to have a life of it’s own. Unrelenting horror biz ensues.
Look, I can’t slap a revoltin’ review on Brahms: The Boy II without mentioning 2016’s original recipe The Boy… and you bet your ass there is a spoiler or two heading your way, so consider your arcane asses duly warned.
The thing I hated the most about the first entry is fixed-as-all-fuck this go-around… namely the nature of the doll, Brahms, itself. In the first movie, that doll was just a cover for some other sinister shit (though this film attempts to explain that in a throw-away manner)… but in this fright flick the doll is well and truly evil.
That is a big plus for your’s cruelly, and worth a metric ass-load of beastly brownie points.
Also of note are the quality performances from the principals; Katie Holmes, Owain Yeoman, and Christopher Convery, who do the heavy lifting of making this ghoulish goodness believable, as well as the monochromatic and dreary aesthetic that gives these supernatural shenanigans a suitably Autumnal vibe… not to mention those Gothic thriller tropes of the old dark house and haunted familial relationships.
On the downside, get set for a shit-ton of music stings and jump scares in this one… which is kind of a predictable and pandering course of action considering the top-notch ambiance, acting chops, and world building on display here.
Anyhow, along with the main event, Universal have peppered this Blu-ray release with some eerie extras including: an alternate ending, a collection of deleted and alternate scenes, and a DVD and digital version of the film.
To sum it all up: I enjoyed Brahms: The Boy II… it fixed my main gripe from the first fearsome feature, plus added a dash of mythology and Gothic finery to the proceedings… but it suffers from a bit of the dreaded jump (read: easy) scare.