Barry, a small town in southern Wales is known for its beautiful beaches, for being, in the early 20th century, the world’s largest coal exporter, and, for fans of low-budget horror, as the Detroit of scary puppet movies. From this picturesque seaside village, Lawrence Fowler and his father Geoff are steadily turning out evil doll films. Son Lawrence writes and directs the tales of toy people doing nasty things to gentle folk in old castles and country manors. Dad Geoff, a tinkerer of that very British sort, builds the puppets.
What started with The Curse of the Witch’s Doll (2018), a crowd-funded tale of a sweet little dolly possessed by a 17th-century witch, has become an assembly line of hand-made horror. In the last eight years, Fowler Media Ltd. has delivered a trilogy of marionette jump scare flicks: The Jack in the Box (2019), Jack in the Box: Awakening (2022), The Jack in the Box Rises (2024), an old-school haunted house tale, The Ghost Within (2023), and has just finished production of Rob1n, a M3gan-esque story of a lonely man who builds a robot companion unaware its source code includes the spirit of his long-dead murderous son.
“We didn’t start off thinking we’d make all these puppet-based horror movies, but they seemed to be well-received,” says Lawrence, “the industry seemed to like them, the audience seemed to like them, so we kept making them.”
Jack in the Box — featuring a creepy wind-up spring toy that morphs into a murderous demon — racked up more than 1 million theatrical admissions internationally, even cracking the top 10 in Italy (albeit during COVID when theaters were strapped for content). Jack in the Box: Awakening has had “at least 3 million theatrical admissions worldwide,” mostly in Latin America and South East Asia, notes Glenn Ackermann of German-based Scary Content, a low-budget horror specialist —their AFM late includes demon possession movies Face of Evil and The Crucifix — which has handled world sales for the Fowler films since the first Jack in the Box. “We only do theatrical releases, movies that will have a theatrical release in some territories. And there is consistent demand for the Fowler films. They are a known brand. That’s pretty good for a father-and-son team in Wales making independent movies.”
“Their films look good, they are well-designed and well-plotted with good jump scares,” adds Scary Content’s David Marsh. “I watch a hell of a lot of these [low-budget horror] movies and they’re ahead of the rest. They are really a cut above.”
Scary doll movies have become the Fowler family business. Lawrence’s wife acts as the production manager. His mother, Geoff’s wife is in charge of props “and doubles as chief caterer.” With each film, the Fowlers have gotten more ambitious. “Budget-wise, Rob1n is at least 10 times more than what had for The Witch’s Doll,” says Lawrence, meaning a jump from high-five to low-six figures, and Geoff’s tinker-box creations are becoming ever more technically elaborate. For Rob1n, he built the fully motorized robot doll from scratch, designing and assembling the parts with 3D printers. It was designed to work as both a robot, or “if we had a Jaws situation, and the doll broke down,” says Lawrence, to be used as a puppet.
“There are roughly 200 effect shots in the film and 90 to 99 percent are done in camera, practical effects. “I think of lot of genre fans really appreciate that,” he adds, proudly. “We keep trying to push ourselves further. On this film we set a character on fire for the first time. That was fun.”
English (US) ·