Dr. Giggles has a promising start, only to end up in a rut

There are many truely awful horror films out there these days. No one seems to be able to make a movie that comes with gore AND a story. It's either/or. But when a movie has neither, that's when you get a real dud. And that's what Dr. Giggles is. I was expecting a lot of blood and guts, and maybe even a story behind it all. What did I get? Exactly opposite. Sure, there is some blood here and there, but nothing shocking or gross. Most of the gross things are just the thought of what is happening (someone gets a thermometer with a sharp end shoved through their head, but you don't see it really happen).

But that's not what is really bad about this movie. The fact that the performances are weak and there is no story pretty much takes all the fun out of the movie. Sure, it's fun to watch Dr. Giggles (Larry Drake) go around and kill people. But for what reason? I consider that even insane people have to have a reason to kill people. Dr. Giggles just kills people. No reason, just does it. In one scene, a lady has a tube stuck down her throat to have all the ice cream that she ate extracted. Inside this tube, however, is a retractible blade that slices her esophagus. The thought is sickening, but we don't see much.

As for the performances, there really is only one good performance and that's done by Holly Marie Combs. She was the only reason that I gave the movie 1/2 star more. Dr. Giggles (someone) was insane and I felt sorry for someone because they had to do all these sick things, but we don't care. In fact, Dr. Giggles kills off almost every single person in the movie. I think about 3 people lived out of the 10 or 15 that were first there. Most of the people were there just to be killed and we don't care about them either.

There are many things that bothered me in this movie, but the biggest thing is that old concept of the bad guy appearing to have been killed and then come back later. I don't mind this concept because it usually adds excitement to a horror movie. But I say, if a killer can come back to life three or four different times, then he is Superman... or a cat. Dr. Giggles is killed in an explosion, electricuted, shot, and finally stabbed. The producers could have left out the shooting and the stabbing, and just gone for the electricution, because I enjoyed that. After a while, I got sick of seeing Dr. Giggles.

Dr. Giggles is rated R. I praise the makers of this movie for using restraint and not adding sex and nudity. There is a scene involving a condom, but it's not very offensive. The violence and gore are plenty, but there isn't enough. Most of the violence is done off screen and we only see what is there afterwards. There isn't that much offensive language either. So why the R rating? Maybe it's because the MPAA raters decided it was too bad of a movie to give a PG-13 rating to. But I have to give credit to someone and the screenwriters (who gave us dialogue like, "It's time to do what doctors do best!" and then zoom over to a set of golf clubs) for making it mildly enjoyable to watch. But there are too many things wrong with this movie, so I suggest you watch Nightmare On Elm Street or Candyman.