• Director: Jim Kaufman
• Written by: Kevin Tenney
• Running Time: 85 minutes
• Language: English
• MPAA Rating: R - Restricted
• Cast: Larry Day, Amelia Kinkade, Kristen Holden-Ried, Vlasta Vrana, Tara Slone, Christian Tessier, Joel Gordon, Patricia Rodriguez, Stephanie Bauder, Ian McDonald, Richard Jutras, Gregory Calpakis, Minor Mustain, Richard Zeman, Sirod, James W. Quinn, Cecile Cristobal

A long time fan of Kevin Tenney’s work, if only because of the original “Night of the Demons” - a film that I measured a grand treasure in my youth - I could hardly wait to see what he would do with the third incarnation of the series, this time in a straight writing capacity. Forgetting outright the sequel, a film that was so bad it barely warrants a mention, “Night of the Demons III”, the natural successor, in my opinion, to the 1988 film, strides much of the same ground and wears pretty much the same spooky get-up as the original, however, in a unique early move, the film does manage to step over into another genre, the typically dark crime-drama, if only to push the plot where it needs to go allowing for the rest of the film to unravel. This quick burst of imaginative fervour eventually leads back to the expected derivative horror stuff (a bunch of kids trapped in a haunted house), which, in this film’s case, works only to drive the film off a cliff at least in an entertainment sense. As much as I wanted to love this film, I just couldn't.

Shades of the original 1988 cast, a vanload of teenage stereotypes including nebbish Orson (Christian Tessier); bad boy 70s era Cali-skater punk Vince (Kristen Holden-Reid); Vince’s bitchy, forever-sneering girlfriend Lois (Tara Slone); a typically Brando-inspired rebel without a clue Nick (Gregory Calpakis) and his pal Reggie (Joel Gordon), who seems to act as the film’s token black guy, complete with a never-ending mental log of lame “Yo Mama" jokes, jive talk and other such typically stupid ethnically-based character traits. Not a sideways hat or gangsta riff to be found, which, I guess, is probably a small miracle of which I should be thankful. Coincidentally, early that night, this cluster of twenty-something teens arrive just in time in their Scooby Do van to help out a pair stranded motorists who are running late for the school’s Halloween Dance. Unlike the original, this isn’t some chubby guy wearing a pig nose looking for a ride, nope, this time around, it’s a head cheerleader, Holly (Stephanie Bauder) and her hanger-on friend Abbie (Patricia Rodriguez), a girl whose homely looks and lesbian tendencies have earned her the nick-name Holly’s 'shadow' amongst her school chums. As it turns out, Abbie is one of those “Hollywood nerds” in that she’s possibly the best looking girl in the cast, however, by the mere fact that she’s wearing glasses, we’re supposed buy the notion that she’s some horrid beast. Anyone familiar with “Not Another Teen Movie” will understand perfectly. Fortunately, Abbie has no problem getting lewd in the nude and even bookends the film with her scantily glad heroics, in two scenes that are all kinds of awesome. Anyways, despite some early scenes, which hint that she might have a “thing” for Holly, it’s spotting Vince in the van, with his blonde locks fluttering in the breeze that makes her exhale. She practically forces Holly into the Scooby-van. Don’t worry, though, as Vince promises to get them to the Dance on time. While Lois sizes up Abbie, who is sneaking peeks at her boyfriend, she happily contemplates clawing her eyes out. Holly makes googly eyes of her own at quiet tough-guy Nick, who remembers her from that one day he spent in one of her classes, before he quit to pursue a future as an unemployed slacker.

A harmless pit stop at an out of the way gas station eventually devolves into utter pandemonium, as the teens are confronted by a gun happy redneck cashier, who takes offense to Reggie’s ill-timed “Yo Mama" joke. The arrival of two police officers looking for some java, combined with an inadvertent shotgun jostle, results in a full-blown Western-era gun fight, one that feels strangely reminiscent of an old CSI episode I just watched. With Reggie shot and dying, the teens quickly pile into the van to make their less than clean getaway. In their wake, a police officer lays with a bullet lodged in his Kevlar vest while the other stands attempting to make sense of what the fuck just happened. Stressed that he just killed a cop and the realization that the van is running low on fuel, Vince forces the group to take refuge in the town’s mythic mortuary turned local spook house, Hull House. Considering that it’s located way out in the middle of nowhere and everybody, outside of some community officers, steers way wide of it, it seems like a safe place to lay low for awhile. Oh, how wrong they are.

Amelia Kinkade, the actress who played Angela in the first two films, seems happy to reprise her cult icon-to-be Demoness character once more. Amelia, in my opinion, has never looked or sounded sexier, an attribute that bodes well for this film considering that the only card in her deck appears to be that of predatory seductress. Unlike the original, where Angela appeared on screen as a smart Goth-child fascinated by the occult and everything evil, she left her mark on audience folk mainly because she was the only female in the film with any sense…or balls. When she is seemingly gobbled up by the evil inside the house, later to be spit out as a crust of her former self – a gravel-voiced, sharp-fanged Demonic master-of-ceremonies hell-bent on turning Halloween at Hull House into the most rocking party in town, it’s those images of Demon-Angela gliding through the halls like an angry apparition that lingered through to my adulthood. Sadly, here, this Angela is not that Angela. This Angela is a sexually charged dynamo fastidiously working the sexual wants of the group as it suits her. Such is the depth of her character, giving a handgun a blowjob in a pointless seduction scene. For the soft-spoken, self-conscious Abbie it means embracing her dark side, indulging in some warm-up lesbian hanky-panky with Angela before being turned loose on Vince in a claustrophobic sexual tryst that had me hitting the rewind button more than a couple of times. To top things off, there’s her catfight with Vince’s main squeeze Lois, one that turns ugly and helps to usher in the supernatural-tinged zombie/ghoul carnage that follows. Meow!

An aging, Columbo-like Detective Dewhurst (Vlasta Vrana), mere hours away from retirement (aren’t they always), finds himself unable to walk away from the case even when he’s no longer on the clock. His hunt for the teens, if only to tell them that they are innocent, provides an interesting narrative side-garnish, one that probably doesn’t fit in the film but works in its own universe. At times, the scenes where we are riding shotgun with Vrana as he travels up and down the darkened forested back roads looking for the kids, are more interesting than the sexual and spiritual mumbo-jumbo stuff happening back at the house. I have to admit, I’m a huge fan of character actor Vlasta Vrana going all the way back to his first film, David Cronenberg’s “Shivers” and seeing him here was a treat. For me, Vlasta is as much a Canadian icon as Don Cherry. His filmography lists some 182 films including some of my all-time A and B-flick favourites; “Rabid”, “Happy Birthday to Me”, “Gas”, “The Amateur”, “Breaking All the Rules”, “The Blue Man”, “Scanners II: The New Order”, “Brainscan”, “Hawk's Vengeance”, “Eye of the Beholder”, “Secret Window”, “Wargames: The Dead Code” and “Dead Like Me: Life After Death”. I’d go so far as to say that, if any a reason existed to see “Night of the Demons III”, it’s Vlasta.

Overall, this film isn’t nearly as good as the original but is infinitely better than the sequel. There are some flashes of tension and even a couple of “that’s kind of cool” moments (the sequence where Angela barks at Lois, calling her “a fucking snake” before she actually turns into a snake, comes to mind) but overall, it’s a mostly chaotic affair, seemingly lacking in overall direction. This is most evident in the film’s cartoony final half where it seems to saunter along without a concentrated focus. I blame some of it on Director Jim Kaufman whose 1999 film “Nightmare Man” suffered from the exact same lack of focus and skill. I also didn’t much care for some of upgrades; the electrified fence, to be exact, nor did I care for some of the make-up effects, which looked cheap at times. I sense that I’m just nit-picking at this point, so I guess I'll end it. Avoid this film. Dig out the original instead.