The Boy - D

Rated PG-13, 97 minutes

Lauren Cohan

The tepid, inane new horror film "The Boy" is about as lifeless as the creepy doll who is the centerpiece of this nonsense that's not as scary as learning how many calories are in that popcorn you're eating as you watch it. A young American named Greta ("The Walking Dead's" Lauren Cohan) takes a job as a nanny for a young boy in a remote English village. To her surprise, Greta learns that the child of the couple (Jim Norton and Diana Hardcastle) is a life-size doll, caring for it as a human helps the couple to cope with the death of their own son 20 years earlier. When Greta violates a list of strict rules, a series of disturbing and inexplicable events bring her worst fears to life, leading her to believe that the doll is alive. "The Boy" is one of the dumbest, least scary horror films to come out of Hollywood in about 2 weeks, after the silly mess that was "The Forest," and worst of all, the doll gives the most believable performance in this terribly slow and just terrible movie. About two-thirds of the film has Cohan, whose character is in England to escape an abusive relationship, wandering around a big, dusty house taking care of that doll who may or may not have magical powers and then somehow becoming enamored with the grocery boy (British stage actor Rupert Evans, who must've really needed the cash). The twist at the end is not really a twist, but a plot point so ridiculous and preposterous that instead of shock it'll elicit a...really, all this just for that? "The Boy" rips off many other better movies and TV shows such as "Twilight Zone," any of which would be far more satisfying than this dreck. In the screening of "The Boy" someone sitting a few rows behind me fell asleep during the first 45 minutes and was breathing so loudly I could hardly hear the screen. That pretty much sums up what a slog and sleep-inducing movie this is. Unless you need a good nap, I'd recommend something else.