While Vinegar Syndrome and its growing partnerships with
other like minded boutique labels curating, restoring and releasing forgotten
off-the-beaten-path oddities on blu-ray disc, 4K UHD or even VHS tape continue
to thrive, a new distinctly SOV (shot-on-video) dedicated label dubbed
Degausser Video emerged among their partner labels moniker with the release of
the 1993 Mexican Child’s Play knockoff Herencia Diabólica translated
into Diabolical Inheritance.
Over time, Annie finds the doll showing up in
strange places and efforts to hide or lock up or merely throw the doll out
prove fruitless as it simply comes right back like the bouncing ball down the
stairwell in The Changeling.
Soon, people close to them including their housemaid and relatives meet
mysterious if not grisly ends and Annie grows convinced the creepy clown doll
is somehow alive and responsible for the growing deaths in the mansion.
The final work from prolific screenwriter and part time film
director Alfredo Salazar who co-wrote the film with Guillermo Seguin, this little
video renter featuring Mexican cult hero Margarito Esparza as the clown doll
and co-starring genre legends Lorena Herrera and Roberto Guinar in the roles of
Roy’s parents is a bit padded out if not long winded despite only running
around seventy-eight minutes.
While
chase scenes involving the doll creeping up on people are effectively spooky
with the eerie man-child dwarf-life face of Esparza donned in clown makeup
zoomed in upon, there’s a lot of filler in the first section of the film that
almost renders some of the later scream-queen scares redundant. Where it soars, however, involves the
complete tossing out of the window of the rules of logic and reason regarding
the film’s monster. Not only is it able
to disappear and reappear at random wherever it pleases but is able to drag
little tyke Roy into the magic acts as well.
Visually speaking despite being shot on film and cut on tape
the cinematography by Marcelo López is serviceable though many of the film’s
darker nighttime scenes in this painstakingly restored tape master are blurry
if not indistinct. You really can’t see
or rightly tell what is happening sometimes with this movie. Sound wise the elements aren’t a whole lot
better with cheap though unnerving keyboard music by Jorge Cuervo in his one
and only musical credit as a composer to date.
Still, the makeup on Margarito Esparza is remarkable and his small yet
lanky figure bringing this Pinocchio like clown doll to life is kinda hair raising
for what its worth. Most people watching
this film now will forget about the plot machinations or tonality as Lorena
Herrera struts about the screen in ridiculous outfits accentuating her every
curve with some scenes of her just bending over to pick something up for the
camera’s benefit. Yes she makes a strong
enough scream queen but her wardrobe department seems to have been run by a
thirsty dude.
Forgotten to time before being caught in the fishing nets of
Vinegar Syndrome’s ongoing combing of the Earth’s surface for all things niche
or cult media related, Diabolical Inheritance isn’t very good or all
that entertaining, no. Mexican if not horror
by itself remains a unique if not increasingly transgressive place to deliver
scary movies. Fans of Chucky and the Child’s
Play film series or just killer doll movies in general ala Dolls or
the Puppet Master movies might come away underwhelmed by Diabolical
Inheritance.
But for film and SOV
historians keen on seeing how other countries responded to the craze, Degausser
Video’s release of the film is splendid and comes with a commentary track by
Hugo Lara and an eleven-minute interview with actor Roberto Guinar. Now the question becomes what will Dagausser
be up to next? Hopefully something just
as uniquely obscure.
--Andrew Kotwicki