Review: ‘The Fuzzies’ will make you nightmarishly cozy
By Bee Delores
There are horror films like Josh Funk’s The Fuzzies that just make you all, well, warm and fuzzy inside. Co-written with Dustin Vaught, the film retools childhood wonder into an agonizingly bizarre stroll down memory lane. In adulthood, society tells us that we need to put away childish things, like our love of cartoons, anime comics, and superhero action figures, for an existence lacking real imagination and packed only with tired responsibilities. But that’s simply a dated standard, a holdover from the Silent Generation. The Fuzzies surprisingly sheds new light on growing up, particularly if you’re a millennial, and how we navigate a world completely devoid of fun.
Shirley Drysdale (Gordy Cassel) built her career on delighting children with puppets, much like Shari Lewis with Lamb Chop. She brings amazement to the world and reminds kids that it’s okay to dream, as long as you dream big. A tragic accident leads to Shirley’s death, and in her last will, she brings together two very important people who grew up with Shirley Drysdale on television, Rose (Rocío de la Grana) and Mick (Vaught), as well as Rose’s dear friend, Mary (Baylee Toney). Rose and Mick have, apparently, been tasked with tracking down Shirley’s primary puppet inside her quaint little home, appropriately surrounded by woodlands.
Naturally, things just aren’t as they seem. The Fuzzies pulls back the curtain on a dark presence that, perhaps, inhabits Shirley’s band of puppets. The film opens with scenes from Shirley’s wildly popular TV show, but behind her eyes and plastered, too-perfect smile, there lurks a darkness, as though she’s begging for help. That insidious evil inhabits bodies, in a very Sesame Street meets Invasion of the Body Snatchers way. As Rose, Mick, and Mary settle into the house, something gnarly and twisted begins to happen, unfurling freak circumstances that could very well end in their bloody deaths.
Funk and Vaught, who turned their short film into a feature, tackle hard truths about being a grown-up, confronting the past, and realizing that nostalgia isn’t what it’s cracked up to be. Through using stop-motion animation, they invite the viewer into a sadistically playful wonderland—one created from childhood innocence and mashed into a psychedelic fever dream. The filmmakers swap out practical effects for puppet-gore. When a puppet severs one character’s hands, for example, the limp hand instantly transforms into felt, with felt blood leaking out onto the floor. It’s that cheekiness that elevates The Fuzzies into a gleeful, yet somehow still macabre, treat.
The Fuzzies will undoubtedly be one of the year’s most polarizing films. Josh Funk and Dustin Vaught pleasure the audience with an unfettered examination of how childhoods can truly be cursed. There’s always chatter online about “ruining” someone’s childhood with cash-grab remakes and legacy sequels, but if you want a horror/comedy to really ruin your childhood, The Fuzzies has you covered all over.
The Fuzzies lands on digital platforms on May 1 via Terror Films Releasing.
