Night of the Demons 3 (1997)
NIGHT OF THE DEMONS
WRITER: Screenplay by Kevin S. Tenney
DIRECTOR: Jimmy Kaufman
STARRING: Amelia Kinkade as Angela
Kris Holdenreid as Vince
Gregory Calpakis as Nick
Patricia Rodriguez as Abbie
Stephanie Bauder as Holly
Tara Slone as Lois
Christian Tessier as Orson
Joel Gordon as Reggie
Vlasta Vrana as Dewhurst
QUICK CUT: Coming back for a threepeat, Angela just won't stay dead. And this time, she's dragging another group of teens into Hull House to kill them off. As opposed to the other two times she dragged kids to her house to kill them off.
THE MORGUE
Vince - Aaah, your local bad boy. He's the guy you knew in high school with the van, and the beer, and who knows what else? Just ask, and he probably has it! He's also got a disturbingly short temper, and what happens to him comes as little surprise.
Abbie - The quiet, shy girl archetype, who's best friends with the hot girl, and wants to date the bad boy. She has issues of inadequacy, and is tired of being overlooked for the hotter cheerleader.
Holly - Abbie's best friend, and the hot girl in school. That's pretty much her entire character. She's hot, and well liked. She doesn't really get much depth, despite being our heroine.
Nick - The secondary level bad boy. He's not quite as bad as Vince, and Holly falls for his looks. There's a running gag that he's not that smart, and is constantly skipping class, to the point that it's even questionable if he even goes to school anymore. Yep, that's date material there!
Lois - Vince's actual girlfriend, and she fills the archetypal role of bad girl. She's a smart mouth, she's snarky, she doesn't take anyone's crap, and is violent and horny most of the time.
Orson - The wannabe bad boy of the group, who is kinda the opposite number of Abbie, in that regard. He's always looking up to Vince, wanting to be the big bad boy, and is just waiting for his opportunity to pop some caps.
Reggie - Quite frankly, the token black guy in the cast. You would think the movie series that gave us such a revolutionary idea as Rodger surviving the first movie would do a better job with a person of colour, but Reggie has zero personality, almost no lines, and gets shot almost immediately so he can sit and moan for the rest of the movie, until he becomes a demon for all of three seconds. He's there to be shot, and you never learn anything about him, besides his need to be constantly making, "Yo momma" jokes.
Detective Dewhurst - The cop hunting after this roving band of thugs, on his last day on the job, just like Falling Down! He loves magic, and tries to introduce lame card tricks into almost every conversation he has, because you gotta remember, he likes magic tricks!!
Angela - And once again, the demon is back. She's a bit more mature this time, with a bigger sense of humour about her. She's got a bit more to do this time around, and she's matured, but she's still our weird girl Angela.
Now with more CGI!
THE GUTS: Happy Triskgiving, fellow horrorheads! I know, by all rights this should be up on the 26th, as it is a) the day I normally post a review, and b) Actual Thanksgiving, but the reviews were lining up falling every six days, and that continues next week, so I just decided to keep going with it, regular schedule be damned.
Anyways, we are back for the final Night of the Demons movie, #3 in the series. Angela may have given us quite a chase, and distracted us with many other devils, but after this review, we'll have caught all the escaping demons from Halloween, and mocked them back into submission, I think.
So let's dive into the final Night of the Demons, and then we can all go enjoy our turkey and pie!
The movie gets right to it, with a cop checking out Hull House, which is most assuredly not Hull House. I was dubious of the second movie, but it definitely was, just lit better. #3, I am positive, is a different house entirely. But I digress. It's surprisingly distracting when the location is this wildly different.
Unit 66...I see what you did there...hears something and investigates, finding Angela still lurking in the hallways. We get a nice continuity drop of #2 as he mentions the schoolkids' massacred, and tries to get Angela to leave. Instead, she magically grabs his badge, and uses it to slice his neck open. Another solid opening at least, with some nice creepy chills, and a death to get the ball rolling.
She fought the law, and she won.
After some pretty slick (For a low budget direct to video movie) opening titles, we meet most of our canon fodder driving around looking to cause some Halloween mischief. And the whitest white kid saying this is 'real def'. Look, I know we talked like that in the 90s but... no. Just...just don't.
OH! Oh! Vince! That...that's Kris Holden-Ried!! Now, I love Kris. Lost Girl is great, Underworld Awakening is a lot of fun, and he has such great screen presence, but look! It's a WEE BABY WEREWOLF. Now, sure, he's got a long road ahead of him to develop his acting skills, and it is SO jarring to see his young face, but HE STILL HAS THE VOICE. That's barely changed *at all*. And he does a good Vince. He has that menace and wildness about him. And while it's rough, I'd still say you can see the skill just waiting to get out and mature. I have no babbled too much about a single actor.
We finish saying hi to them and their snake sock puppet, and jump elsewhere to meet the two lead girls of our little nightmare, Holly and Abbie. And oh look, it's the head cheerleader stereotype who has it easy, and her mousy best friend who complains how she actually has to work for what she wants. And before I make too many references to Angela's sister, Abbie decides to wear a cat costume, so instead of a Mouse, we have a Cat.
Since everyone's busy getting ready for Halloween, we cut back to Angela as she turns the cop's ride into the first Google Car, making it park itself around back and out of sight.
This prequel of Lost Girl looks terrible.
But enough evil parking, it's back to the van of tools, as Orson insults Lois, so her boyfriend Vince decides to choke him. While he's driving. And tells one of the others to fuck off when he complains. Oh yeah, this is a LOVELY group of people you just want to survive the movie, right?
If that wasn't enough, Reggie starts doing 'yo mamma' jokes. Nothing will date your movie quicker, except for cellphones.
Our two plots thankfully collide, because the girls have had their car break down, and the van of fools pulls up alongside to one part offer help, and one part mock them.
These guys? Oh, that's just purrrrfect.
So after some convincing, the girls pile into the van, and it's clear that Abbie the tabby has a thing for the alpha dog Vince, because he's your typical psychotic bad boy. And Holly seems to have a thing for Nick, the guy who's never at school, because failing classes is hawt.
Before we can arrive at Plot Point Junction, they stop off at a Quick Mart so Vince can grab some smokes and road beers. And this is precisely the moment when things start to go wrong.
Reggie lifted his brother's ID and tries to buy some beer, and when the guy behind the counter doesn't buy it, he makes the mistake of reaching for something, making the cashier go for his shotgun under the counter.
Things escalate quickly when Vince grabs the gun, just as a pair of cops come in. Things rapidly go south, and he shoots one of the cops. Another other cops retaliates and shoots Reggie.
Rodger would be so ashamed right now.
So the movie has driven off the main road of the plot, and wandered into an unrelated convenience store cul-de-sac shootout with the cops. Why are we doing this? Is this because we complained about the pace of the first movie, so you added some rooty tooty super shooty?
Everyone runs for the van, and drives from the scene of the crime. Oh, I bet Holly and Abbie are glad they came along for the ride now, huh?
They want to stop and get Reggie some help, but Vince just shot a cop, and refuses to stop. And unbeknownst to them, he was wearing a flak jacket, so he's okay!
Friends don't let friends shoot and drive.
While the kids drive around to inevitably wind up at Hull House, we have a homicide detective at the convenience store doing his thing. And he is two hours away from retirement!!
The cashier tries to pin it on the kids as a robbery gone wrong, but Dewhurst quickly puts it together that it was all a series of accidents. No one got hurt, so he doesn't want the cops seeking vengeance for the shooting. There's been enough bloodshed tonight, he says? Oh, not by half. This movie better step it up, in fact.
So the kids find their way to the actual plot of the movie, almost 30 minutes in, and cross the obligatory reference to the underground stream. I do love me some consistency.
Sliiiiiiiders
Everyone drags poor Reggie into the not as abandoned as they hope it is ex-funeral home, and Abbie's the only one who feels the bad vibes coming.
Vince doesn't believe the ghost stories, and follows in Shirley's footsteps, calling out for anyone to come out and visit. When that doesn't work, he decides to get louder and shoot the walls up. Which later start bleeding, because why not at this point?
And wouldn't you know it, Vince calls up the ghost of movies past, as we get to see the same reused shots of the furnace, demon faces, and Angela whooshing through the halls they've used for three movies now.
At least Angela cleaned this dump up.
So Angela wanders into the plot, claiming she lives here, and I guess she does, technically. It's not like she's going anywhere what with the underground stream and such.
Orson starts waving around the cop's gun he stole during the convenience store chaos, and there's a standoff with Vince. Rather than shoot more people, Angela uses her mind control powers she just developed, to have Orson suggest splitting up to make sure Angela's actually alone.
Y'know. I hadn't seen this yet when I was watching #2, when I made a joke about the house's only power being to magically make groups split up. I WAS KIDDING.
So of course, Vince, his girlfriend the shotgun, his actual girlfriend Lois, and Nick head upstairs to check things out, while Orson stays with the rest downstairs and Demona puts on some music.
Oh good, I was wondering when we'd get to the inevitable dance sequence.
While Orson is distracted by dancing demons (Wait something isn't right here...), the rest sneak out to the van to try and escape. Including the guy who's been gutshot and probably shouldn't be so mobile.
Back inside, Angela gives a blow job to Orson's gun, and spits the bullets out into his hand. It's probably a good thing she doesn't swallow. Should I really point out that the gun's a revolver, and the bullets aren't in a single line? Or just accept the magic?
And to finally get this movie going, she goes full on Species and kills Orson with the second worst French kiss ever. But don't worry, we know he'll be back by this point.
She danced so hard, half her dress flew off.
Meanwhile, rather than checking the place out for demons, Vince and Lois are getting naked on the second floor landing. Nick tries to escape while they're distracted, but Vince isn't THAT distracted and fires.
Holly hears the shotgun blast from the van and runs back to the house, but gets distracted by Unit 66's radio, and yay a working car with gas!
Abbie tries to follow, but ends up in the house instead, and being led astray by Angela. She leads the girl to the church out ba...wait, the what out what?? Sigh, never mind. Fine, there's a church here that we've never seen before.
We watch as Angela tries to seduce Abbie with power and looks, the chance to not be just the cheerleader's cute friend, and what is this? The demonic version of She's All That?
Demona tries to pass on her demon side with the usual kiss, but Abbie says no, and we get our first new glimpse of Angela in full demonface.
Some gals don't want to be pals.
Vince and Lois see the flashes of light from the church and go to check it out, finding a transformed Abbie into her barely perceptibly different hotter self. Which is really just a skimpier cat outfit, no glasses, and a more seductive stance.
Holly gives up trying to get into the abandoned cop car, and heads inside, finding Orson's dead body. He comes back to life, with a freshly bonded demon mask on his face and spooks her off so she can run around the house some more and call out names.
While Vince and Abbie are banging on the church's altar with Lois listening in, Angela goes and pays the wounded Reggie a visit. For someone who got shot at the start of the movie, he's remarkably persistent.
I can bring whole cities to ruin, and still have time to get a soft-shoe in.
Once he's out of the van, Orson hops behind the wheel and chases Reggie down, running him over. Come on, the gunshot was gonna do him in eventually. You couldn't have waited? The movie couldn't have just let him die 20 minutes ago?
Vince hears the van and stops banging Miss Kitty, leaving her and his girlfriend alone, while he finds the crashed van.
Lois confronts Abbie, and the naturally possessed demon girl grows claws, and attacks, along with cat demon facial transformation.
Is she a Shadowcat or a Cyclops? I'm confused.
She runs from the cat, and right into the waiting arms of Angela, who declares she's a snake. Oh, and she is STILL wearing the snake sock puppet from the start of the movie, so you know where this is going.
While Vince looks for any of his girlfriends, Lois runs for the preparation room of the mortuary, where her sock puppet hand gets a bit of a puppety upgrade, and becomes a real snake. Well, realER. It's still clearly fake. Either way, it's gone a bit Curse II in here.
And then the hand turns on her, and it bites her face off. Sigh, when the left hand doesn't know what the snake hand is doing...
Oh for goodness snake.
Vince and Nick briefly run into each other to trade punches, because why not? Pointless action! Meanwhile outside, Holly's back with the police car trying to use the radio, when Officer Larry shows up.
Once he removes his hat and reveals the missing chunk of scalp though, she runs away and right out of the gate. Wow, if it was only that easy to escape the other two movies!
Larry tries to follow, but bounces off the barrier and bursts into flames like a wannabe Phoenix not quite pulling it off and instead going full Icarus.
Nick and Holly run upstairs to the attic, and oh no. Nick's wearing all denim! Is he going to be defenestrated like the last two poor fools?? Surprisingly, while the movie hits a lot of beats of the other films, that one it misses.
They start making out, and fortunately, Orson shows up to stop that before it goes too far and derails the movie. But it's a short lived moment, as Nick tosses turpentine in the masked man's face, and they run some more.
Downstairs, they make it to the door, and run right into Detective Dewhurts, who finally arrives just in time for the end of the movie.
Kids, I've dealt with Scanners, I think I've got this.
Oh yeah! Rememebr Vince? He's stil wandering the plot, and finds Angela. He takes her hostage and tries to use her to escape past the cop.
Dewhorse explains no one's actually been killed...er, never mind, you know what he means, and tries to dewfuse the situation. But Angela continues to be manipulative, and it's time for another shootout!
Vince thought this was all fun and games, but he gets shot right in the eye. The cop tries to help the poor woman the kid held hostage, and yeah, that doesn't end well for him.
I'm gonna take her and go, and she'll make me a supermegaultra werewolf!!
Before he can get executionaled by Demona, Nick grabs the shotgun and shoots her, making her go all smokey, and revealing her demonface.
The remaining three run for the cop car, and wouldn't you know it? Once again we have that classic scene of being unable to unlock your own damned car door.
Officer Larry returns again, and they get surrounded by various demonic versions of their friends, and this is what's gonna pass for a final confrontation, isn't it?
Nick pops off a few shots, before Angela intervenes, and makes a deal that Nick and the cop can go free, if Holly offers up her tasty soul of her own choice.
Go into the light! PLEASE go into the light!
Just as the demons are all heading home, Nick decides to be a hero, and has the cop make a diversion. This entire thing has pretty much been Night of the Diversions, hasn't it?
Dewversion goes up to Angela and does a magic trick, which he uses to sleight a knife into his hand, and stab our villain in the gut. The cop grabs Holly and runs away, as Nick crashes one of the cars into the witch, pinning her against a tree.
They try and drive off, but the car didn't like the tree very much, so instead they make a run for it while all the demons hide inside Hull House 2.0
Oh, and before we're done, Dewgiciain points out that there was no footage of them at the Try 'N' Save, so no one knows they were there, and they're free to go. Because we cared about THAT by this point of the movie.
But it's never this easy, and before they can run out the gate, Angela pops up once more to punch Mountain Dewhurst through the chest and remove his heart.
He was only six hours into his retirement! ANGELAAAAAAAA!!
While Angela is gloating and cracking wise, the couple make a run for it once more, and almost get across the gate. However, Angela uses horror movie villain speed to catch up and grab Holly's wrist before the last bits of her can leave the property.
It's not just the stream Angela has to deal with though, as the sun starts to come up, and her powers weaken. Holly pulls her right into the mystical barrier, and her flesh and bones peel apart at the gateway to Hull...House.
So the sun comes up, and our heroes close the gate on Hull House, riding off into the sunrise as the sole survivors of this third Halloween party massacre.
Oh Angela, you are just skin and bones! You should eat something!
I love Nick saying the cops will investigate, and the government. Yeah, because evil haunted houses are the sort of thing they bother with. You've blown the lid off that conspiracy!
But to top that off, Holly declares that she will forever come back on Halloween to make sure this never happens again. Heck, just throw a party outside the gates. You've got nice atmosphere, a creepy locale, and strength in numbers! And if you lose a person here and there for being too curious...ehh, it's their own damned fault.
And thus ends Night of the Demons 3, with pretty much everyone dead, the demons all captures, and MONTH OF THE DEMONS draws to a close
Oh yeah, that branch will stop people from opening the gate. Good job.
BUT WAIT THERE'S MORE.
MONTH OF THE DEMONS...IS NOT OVER YET. The event so large, it could not be contained to just November.
This may be the end of Angela's original adventures, but in 2009, Angela was reborn in a brand new younger body, given a fresh reboot, and a whole new attempt at restarting the franchise, with a whole new Night of the Demons.
Come back on DECEMBER 1ST as I try once more to put a stop to Angela and her evil ways.
AUTOPSY REPORT
Video: It's a straight to video transfered to DVD. It doesn't look great. The colours are bland, the video is soft, it's just a mess for something that should look a *little* better than this, at least.
Audio: Nothing special to report.
Sound Bite: "Sarge, are you okay??" "I just flew through a frickin' window! Of course I'm not okay!"
Body Count: The typical caveats apply, since this movie likes killing people to demonise them, and then killing the demons. I'm pretty sure Officer Scary Larry died at least three times.
1 - Just under four minutes in, and Angela offs a local cop who noses around Hull House.
2 - Nearly 40 minutes later, and Orson dies when a tongue explodes the back of his head.
3 - We don't see it, but Abbie probably dies her first death in a flash of demon lightning.
4 - Reggie survived being shot in the gut, only to be run over by a van.
5 - Holly gets eaten by her own snake hand.
6 - Officer Larry dies again when he rebounds off the water barrier.
7 - Vince dies with a bullet to the face.
8 - Angela really retires Dewhurst when she rips out his heart.
9 - And finally, after three movies, Angela gets skinned alive by being dragged over a mystical barrier.
Best Corpse: No challenge, the flayed and melting and bones of Angela. It was a good send off to this long running franchise baddie.
Blood Type - C: Absolutely solid, with some good splatters here and there, and occasionally good effects. We won't mention the snake.
Sex Appeal: The girls provide plenty of titilation, and I'm pretty sure Holly's nudity was a body double...
Drink Up! whenever someone tells a yo mama joke.
Video Nasties: Just some quick fun silliness of Dewhurst's magic trickery, and some cool demon face and gore from Angela.
Movie Review: This movie somehow manages to be better, but so much worse, than the original movie. The pace, is actually improved upon. HOWEVER, it improves upon it with randomly unrelated scenes. Sure, the convenience store not!Robbery is interesting, but it's unrelated to the plot, save for moving the chess pieces where the movie wants. It's the sort of scene you want to avoid, because there's no emotional connection, it just happens for plot sake. The acting isn't great, and a lot of scenes feel like the actors weren't even there on the same days, It's super low budget, and I don't ding it for that, but it shows. There is absolutely promise here, and the idea feels like something that's good, and probably sounded good when it was conceived, but things went wrong in the final execution. Two out of five demon cats.
Entertainment Value: Even at its worst, the first two movies had some amazingly creative death scenes and visuals, so even if the plot was dragging, it was never boring. A lot of this movie has a been there, done that feel. It's very much done by rote, and not a single one of the demonisations has any creative flair to it. Run over by a van? Shot in the eye? Where's the 'beheaded and then goes to play basketball with his severed skull' type stuff? Not here, sadly. And having a slow plot with random scenes and not much special vision behind it, makes this movie drag. It's still a cheesefest, and Angela is channeling a bit more of a snarky Krueger type (But nowhere NEAR as over the top as he got), which certainly helps, but ultimately the movie just never figures itself out. Three out of five deadly ninja sheriff badges.
