Saw Pin (thanks Lea!) It was a psychodrama from the 80s about two children (a daughter and son) of a doctor who has an anatomical dummy in his office which he uses to put patients at ease. He uses ventriloquism to make the dummy "talk." This is sort of creepy on its own, but within the realm of misguided adult attempts to comfort children. Alas, this has a profound effect on the son of the doctor, who reaches adulthood, still firmly believing that the dummy can talk. Over time, the dummy's "personality" takes a more sinister, demanding turn.
Although it came from the 80s, the film has a Hitchcockian, giallo feel to it. There's pop psychology, and attempts to placate and fool the psychopathic antagonist. The over-the-top premise is handled seriously and the film wrings some genuine freakiness from the bizarre dummy and the creepy son. Ultimately, the true horror of the film is about psychological abuse and seeing the damage wrought by the son is something to behold.
There's also something thematic going on with graven images and reproduction. The son and daughter, perhaps unconsciously, mirror their parents' seating positions and postures. They are not just the children of their parents, they are becoming their parents in some way. Similarly, the dummy is called "Pin" which is revealed to be short for Pinocchio, the puppet who wanted to be real. The doctor father tries to make the puppet into another sort of parent for the children, but as the generational divide collapses, the son takes over that roll. All very neat!
So the film was solid. It's obscure for no reason which is very obvious to me. I guess it was out of step with its time. It doesn't have a big scary villain that will launch 1,000 sequels and instead uses more 1970s psycho-horror to drive its scares. It holds up now however. Go see it!
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