In a year filled with many styles of independent horror, “American Dollhouse” writer and director John Valley brings back a rollicking element: An outrageous villain. In the film, which premiered at this year’s South by Southwest and had lively screenings at New Orleans’ Overlook Film Festival, a young woman named Sarah (Hailley Lauren) moves back home after her mother’s death to clean up the family house and get her own life in order. Unfortunately, neighbor Sandy (Kelsey Pribilski) is unhinged and has some opinions about Sarah’s potential changes to the property, and things get dark quickly.
“Dollhouse,” which is still seeking distribution as it continues on the festival circuit, comes from Iowa native Valley, who didn’t have to look far to find inspiration for the idea.
“The question is, ‘What scares me?'” Valley says. “This last decade or so, there’s a sense of paranoia out on the street, these places where you think we’re supposed to be safe, and you can operate without feeling like you’re being watched all the time or judged. So the idea that sidewalks or our streets in broad daylight are these places where terror is looming at any hour of the day, it’s crushing to me. You take that real feeling that I can touch at any point and commune with, and then figure out how to apply that to the physical expression of filmmaking. Sandy, the villain of the film, is this manifestation of the panopticon, the terror of polite society.”
