From Dusk Till Dawn 3: The Hangman’s Daughter (1999)

Directed by P.J. Pesce [Other horror films: Lost Boys: The Tribe (2008)]

The second straight-to-video From Dusk Till Dawn was a hard one to go into with anything nearing moderate expectations. I hated the second one, and I really never cared much for the first. Of course, the third time’s the cha- wait, no, this was utter shit too.

I’ll give the movie credit for having interesting characters. Michael Parks was pretty fun in his role. Lennie Loftin was somewhat amusing in his breaking bad scene, and Rebecca Gayheart (Urban Legend) was decently attractive, and her story went an unexpected direction. I didn’t think that we learned enough about Marco Leonardi’s character to make an impression, but Temuera Morrison at least looked threatening. Neither Ara Celi nor Jordana Spiro did anything for me.

Still, overall the cast is decent. It’s a shame that the story is so God-awful. I mean, sure, it connects to the first film far more than the second film ever did (which might make inherent sense, given this is a prequel), but when the story and special effects are as insufferable as was present here, I don’t think an increased attention to continuity really matters. Especially when the exact same final shot from the first film is used here, which I suspect most people saw coming.

Of course, they throw in an awful and pointless post-credits scene, but what you would expect? I mean, it’s awful, but at least it keeps it’s consistency with the rest of the film. And truth be told, the more I think about this one, the more I find it hard to believe that some people like it more than the second. The second was bad, don’t get me wrong, but this just struck me as much worse.

Honestly, it may not really amount to much. Both direct-to-video sequels were awful, and while I found this quite a bit worse, neither one gets anywhere close to the first movie, which, as I said, I wasn’t even that fond of. You get some okay characters here, and maybe an amusing scene or two, but honestly, this really isn’t worth much at all, unless Exorcist references are all you look for in life.

4/10