Amityvile 3

Amityville 3 title

AKA: Amityville 3D, Amityville : The Demon, Amityville 3 : The Demon.

Tag Line : Enter the gateway to Hell at your peril...

Just when you thought the series couldn't get any worse, along comes Amityville 3. As part 2 had been made to cash in on the success of the Exorcist, this latest pointless exercise was made solely for the purpose of cashing in on the 3D film market during the very short lived craze of 3D films that came out in the early 80's, (those old enough may remember Jaws 3D and Friday the 13th Part 3 in 3D).

The film begins with us being shown a couple of psychic mediums, who have been performing séances at the old Amityville house, only to have their racket exposed as one big hoax by a couple of spook reporters, John Baxter (Tony Roberts) and Melanie (Candy Clark).

After the landlord kicks out the unscrupulous occupants, John decides to buy the place for himself and therefore defy local superstitions about it being haunted. The rest of the plot is fairly immaterial as you can sort of guess what's going to happen, which involves more swarms of flies appearing in the back bedroom, people seeing ghostly apparitions and various objects being dangled in front of the camera lens at every opportunity for the benefit of the 3D audience.

They later discover that the old well in the basement (as seen in part 1) is actually a gateway to hell, which is what's been causing the ghostly goings on, even though that in part 1 they said it was because the previous building on the site was a loony bin for the criminally insane, and in part 2 because the house was built on an Indian burial ground (wish they'd make their minds up).

The demon creature from part 2 then pops-up out of the well and the film climaxes in a bizarre "poltergeist" style finale, with everyone running from the house as an icy wind blows through the place and stuff goes flying around the rooms, before the building finally destroys itself.

This film sucks and is not helped by the fact that it looks even stupider now that the 3D effects where removed for the video release, although the scene where the swordfish goes flying across the room at the end was kind of interesting, but really there's absolutely NOTHING worthwhile about this movie to recommend it. As with part 2, AVOID AT ALL COSTS!!!!

Overall Marks : 3/10

Other Information.

The films director Richard Fleischer went onto work on the classic barbarian films "Red Sonja" and "Conan the Destroyer". Prior to "Amityville 3" he had worked on the classic sci-fi pic "Fantastic Voyage", war epic "Tora, Tora, Tora" and the Neil Diamond musical "The Jazz Singer" (Ugh!).
Candy Clarke who plays Melanie, went onto play the role of Buffy's mother in the motion picture version of "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" in 1992. She also starred in "Q-The Winged Serpent", "Steven King's Cats Eyes", the 1998 version of "The Blob" and the 2000 horror pic "Cherry Falls".
Grossed over $2million on its opening weekend in the US.
The phone number for the Amityville Real Estate company on the sign at the start of the film was 666-1818.
Look out for a young Meg Ryan, better known these days for her romantic comedies with Tom Hanks, who makes an appearance in the film as one of the teenage friends (listed in the credits as Lisa).
Robert Joy, who plays Elliot West, went on to star in "Steven King's - The Dark Half".
The 2004 UK DVD re-issue by Sanctuary entertainment featured the 3D version of the film, and came with 2 pairs of 3D glasses.