Your Movie Library
Cast
- Catherine HicksKaren Barclay
- Chris SarandonMike Norris
- Alex VincentAndy Barclay
- Brad DourifChucky (voice) / Charles Lee Ray
- Dinah ManoffMaggie Peterson
- Tommy SwerdlowJack Santos
- Jack ColvinDr. Ardmore
- Neil GiuntoliEddie Caputo
- Juan RamírezPeddler
- Alan WilderMr. Criswell
- 75
Chicago Sun-Times
A cheerfully energetic horror film of the slam-bang school, but slicker and more clever than most, about an evil doll named Charles Lee Ray, or Chucky. - 75
The A.V. Club
Director Tom Holland keeps things moving along, turning the entire film into a pretty ruthlessly efficient scare delivery system. - 75
The A.V. Club
The sequences without Chucky are as stock as they come, and so are all the flesh-and-blood characters around him, but he's still a hugely entertaining mischief-maker, and what he lacks in physical gifts, he compensates for in sneakiness. - 70
IGN
Partially filmed on location in Chicago, the movie benefits from a snowy, urban setting that gives it a very different feel from most films in its genre. Hicks and Chris Sarandon (as the cop who killed serial killer Charles Chucky Lee Ray in the first place) are solid actors and brought a nice adult presence to the story. - 60
Empire
It's nothing wildly original, but it is pacey and entertaining when it gets going. - 60
The New York Times
Child's Play has some limp dialogue among the clever touches. Its appeal is clearly for upscale horror fans rather than a general movie audience. Yet it is a fitting successor to the classic television horror stories it takes off from. - 60
Time Out
While some of the supernatural stuff about witch-doctors and Mojo dolls is a bit daft, Holland's sure handling of the suspense and shock moments lends the film a sharp and scary edge. - 50
The Hollywood Reporter
Most of the laughs seem unintentional and come too late in the movie — after several reels of serious build-up — for the audience to adjust to its tongue-in-cheek qualities. Making a good horror-thriller, or even a good horror-comedy, is not child’s play, as this schizoid film all too unfortunately proves.