The Mannequin (2025) Review

The movie opens in the 1950s, showing a woman getting photographed. The photographer cuts off her head and positions it onto the body of a mannequin. Moving to present day, we meet sisters Liana and Sophia as they are renting an old building to be used as Sophia’s fashion design studio. Yes, it happens to be the same place where the woman in the opening was getting photographed, and was eventually killed. No surprise there. A few days later, Sophia is killed in the studio, perhaps by a grotesque ghost seen creeping around.

One year later. Liana returns from a trip to Italy, where she has been for the last year. She moves into her sister’s studio, determined to continue Sophia’s company. Her BFFs, Hazel and Nadine, come to visit her, and they reunite gleefully – until they don’t; they argue over Liana’s response to her sister’s death. Nadine goes home, and Hazel stays over with Liana, afraid to leave her alone. At some point, Liana wakes up and finds Hazel cutting herself in the neck. Nadine meets the two at the hospital, then the girls all go to Nadine’s for the night. Later, Nadine is haunted by another ghost person, and ends up with her hand down the garbage disposal. Another trip to the hospital.

Liana has finally decided to call her ex-boyfriend, Pete, who is a ghost hunter, to help them figure all this out. They go back to the studio, and Pete sets to work. He describes the history of the studio, that the photographer turned out to be a serial killer. He only killed once a decade, and each time, he would remove body parts: in the 1950s, he took the head; in the 1960s he took the arms; in the 1970s, he took the legs. The missing body parts were never discovered.

This film poses more questions than answers. A lot of them revolve around the finale, and I won’t bring them up because I don’t want to give it away. But it was not well plotted. The biggest problem I had was figuring out how the eponymous Mannequin actually fit in to the plot. Was the Mannequin the killer? Was it just a vessel? Part of a ritual?

There were plenty of other questions throughout the movie. None as pertinent as the ones above, but since they were brought up, they seem important . For example: Liana and Nadine had marks on their body. Why? Was that from supernatural forces? When Liana saw the ghost of her sister, why was that? Was it just her own trauma or is she haunting the studio? And why exactly did Liana break up with her boyfriend?

The questions are driving me crazy.

For people who are looking for some gore, this is not the film for you. Many of the murders are off-camera, which also adds to the question of how these people died. There is the appropriate amount of blood, though, so the director is obviously not squeamish. It feels like this was done to save money. There were no special effects, and very little gore effects

.The acting was fine all around. The girls always seemed to whine and fight with one another (leading to more questions), but they all felt “real” so it prevented the film from feeling fake. Director John Berardo did a good job filming the ghosts, keeping them subtle as they moved in the background, and creepier as they moved in closer.

Overall, The Mannequin was a decent film. Some creepy moments, and if you can prevent yourself from obsessing over the questions the plot leaves you with, you could actually enjoy this film.