The Toybox (2018)

The Toybox (2018)
Written By: DMG
Edited By: Grave Reviews Staff

Film Information

Director: Tom Nagel

Producer: Eric Brenner, Jeff Denton et. al.

Writers: Jeff Denton, Jeff Miller, Brian Nagel, Tom Nagel

Date Released: September 18, 2018

 

Cast:

Denise Richards as Jennifer

Mischa Barton as Samantha

Jeff Denton as Steve

Brian Nagel as Jay

Greg Violand as Charles

Malika Michelle as Olivia

David H. Greathouse as Robert Gunthry

 

***May contain some spoilers

 

Rating = 1.5/5 Graves

 

Synopsis

A family of six people travel in an RV on a road trip. On their way, the family picks up two other people whose car had broken down. While the group is traveling, the RV itself, takes control of the vehicle and causes the vehicle to crash leaving the group stranded in the middle of nowhere. Soon, the family starts to discover the dark secrets behind the RV as the vehicle is causing members of the group to die. With nowhere to go, the family must try to survive the terrors from this RV.

 

Gore Factor

There are some bloody scenes in The Toybox. The most grotesque scene is when you see one of the girls scalped. But as the film focuses on the terrors of the RV, the deaths are more focused on disasters from the vehicle itself. The more disturbing scenes will be from anticipated and suspenseful scenes where you’re waiting for something to happen rather than the explicit gore scenes.

 

The Grave Review

The premise of a possessed RV is quite comical. We have seen many films in the past that revolve around possessed machines such as Maximum Overdrive who’s antagonist was a truck and Christine who’s antagonist was a sedan. The Toybox (2018) follows the same premise of the vehicle terrorizing a group of people. In this way, the plot was by no means original.

What was interesting about this film is that it is loosely based on the crimes of serial killer, David Parker Ray, a rapist, murderer, kidnapper and torturer of women (although murder was never proven but suspected). Ray was referred to as the “Toy-Box Killer” because Ray would bring the women to his RV where the victims would be tortured and drugged among other horrific acts. In the film, The Toybox (2018), Ray is referred to as fictional serial killer, Robert Gunthry (David H. Greathouse).

The protagonists were difficult to connect with during the course of watching this film. The group did not seem to have any feeling or heart for their family members. For example, when one of the members loses her brother, within minutes it seems like the brother is forgotten and the characters just move on. As a result, there seems to be very little time spent on building the  development of the characters.

The antagonist, Robert Gunthry, also has some flaws. In some ways, the serial killer seems to be controlling the RV to cause the death of all the people inside it. However, in other ways, Gunthry, as a spirit, is physically strangling some of the members to death. The fact that Gunthry is both a spirit within RV and can be a physical being makes the threat forced and confusing. Lastly, there was no clear ending to the Toybox.

For the foregoing reasons, Grave Reviews gives The Toybox (2018) one and one-half graves out of five graves.

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