After the dismal critical and commercial failure of Silent Night, Deadly Night 2, which barely made back its budget at the box office- which is all the more embarrassing when you consider that budget was around $100,000- one could be forgiven for thinking that would be that for the franchise.
Yet, it's hard to keep a good idea down, and in spite of the outrage of a different kind that SNDN 2 inspired for its gratuitous use of the original film's footage, it still did decent business on home video, so the franchise kept on chugging after all.
However, once again, the ownership of the franchise traded hands, this time to producer Arthur H. Gorson, perhaps better known as a music producer (Golden Earring, of "Radar Love" and "Twilight Zone" fame, were one of his more high-profile clients) and photographer (his work photographing Bob Marley is especially well-respected and he would later produce a documentary called Roots of Reggae, featuring some of that work).
Gorson also produced quite a few music videos, including ones for artists as diverse as Marilyn Manson and Ozzy Osbourne to Stevie Nicks and Dave Matthews Band to Cypress Hill and Dr. Dre, and he's produced concert films for Iron Maiden, Megadeth and Wu-Tang Clan. He also produced Guillermo Del Toro's much-acclaimed Cronos.
In other words, this was no cut-rate producer looking to make a quick buck. Gorson genuinely felt that a good movie could be made from the material. He and writer S.J. Smith hammered out a screenplay, and drafted another well-respected figure, Monte Hellman, to direct.
Hellman was an old-school Hollywood director who had worked for the legendary Roger Corman (that's footage of a film he worked on for Corman, The Terror, that various people are shown watching throughout the film). He is perhaps best-known for the Westerns Ride-In Whirlwind and The Shooting, with a young Jack Nicholson, and the cult road movie Two-Lane Blacktop, featuring musicians James Taylor and Dennis Wilson. He would also go on to executive produce the debut film by a young, up-and-coming director named Quentin Tarantino: Reservoir Dogs. Maybe you've heard of it?
Hellman agreed to direct the project, only if he could take another pass at the script, which Gorson allowed, and Hellman recruited writer Carlos Laszlo (aka Rex Weiner, best-known for the Andrew "Dice" Clay vehicle The Adventures of Ford Fairlane) to help. Interestingly, the original script by Gorson and Smith would later largely form the basis for the follow-up film in the franchise, SNDN 4: Initiation.
Hellman felt that there was still more to be mined from the original plot-line to the first two films, and set about continuing the story of Ricky, Billy's younger brother, who had ostensibly been killed in the prior film. Of course, you can't keep a good slasher down, so Hellman and Weiner resurrected him- at least to a certain degree- and wrote a screenplay revolving around the efforts of an obsessed doctor to revive a seriously-wounded Ricky completely.
After taking yet another pass at the script with the help of his daughter, Melissa- who would appear in the film as the doctor's assistant- and writer Steven Gaydos (with whom Hellman had just worked with on the film Iguana), Hellman finally had a script everyone, Gorson included, was on board with, and the film was rushed into production. All of this took place over the course of a week, mind you, including the extensive rewrites.
The film began shooting in March of 1989, was finished in April, edited in May and premiered at a film festival in July, which, for those not in the know, is remarkably fast. In spite of this, Hellman considers the resulting film to be some of his best work, which he would reconfirm when the film was shown for a screening at Texas' legendary Alamo Drafthouse, citing the speed with which it was done as a primary factor.
Of course, rushed films tend to not be without fault, and this was certainly no exception, though, in the grand scheme of things, it certainly is a step up from the previous entry, if not as fun in a so-bad-it's-good sort of way. For instance, whoever made the decision to have Ricky spend the entire movie with what looks like a combination of a discarded helmet from a bad 50's-era sci-fi movie and a spaghetti strainer should be taken out back and pelted with tomatoes, lol.
The film revolves around a young blind woman named Laura (Samantha Scully), who is participating in a dubious experiment by Dr. Newbury (Richard Beymer), who hopes she can establish a psychic connection with Ricky Caldwell (Bill Moseley), currently in a coma after the events of the previous film. The idea is, if she can revive him, perhaps she, and others like her, can help to revive other, worthier coma-tized patients.
You see, Laura has psychic powers of a sort, which run in the family, that allow her to somewhat predict the future, albeit in small ways. For instance, her grandmother is shown predicting the phone being about to ring, literally right before it does. Likewise, Laura senses that something bad is about to happen to a receptionist at the hospital, which it also subsequently does.
Laura does indeed establish a sort of communication with Ricky, allowing her to see what he is seeing sometimes, which results in- you guessed it- flashback footage from the first film, yet again. (To be fair, Hellman doesn't use even remotely as much as they did in the previous installment.) For some reason, she downplays what she sees to the not-so-good doctor, dismissing it as something about an "evil Santa." That's putting it mildly!
The doctor presses Laura pretty hardly to continue falling asleep to hopefully dream what Ricky is seeing in his coma, causing her to be reluctant to return when the session is done. Little do either of them know that what they have been doing will have some serious repercussions moving forward, as later on, Ricky awakens, going on a rampage and killing various people at the hospital, including- you guessed it again- a man dressed as Santa, played by a wise-cracking Hellman himself.
It turns out that Laura has indeed established a psychic connection with Ricky, but it's not just a one-way-street. Ricky can also sense what Laura's doing at any time, and is able to figure out where she's headed and arrive before she does, at her grandmother's house, where she is visiting with her brother, Chris (Eric Da Re, sporting some spectacular 80's hair) for Christmas. After dispatching with grandma when she makes the mistake of giving him a present wrapped in red, which sets him off again, he lies in wait for Laura to arrive.
Meanwhile, the cops are in hot pursuit of Ricky, following his bloody trail of bodies as he makes his way to grandma's house, like the Big Bad Wolf he is, with a little help from Dr. Newbury. Leading up the chase is the no-nonsense, but nonetheless always-ready-with-a-joke Lt. Connely (Robert Culp), who was among those who brought Ricky down the first time. Or the second time, that is, given that Ricky was caught, committed to an institution, which he then later escaped from and went on another killing spree afterwards.
Laura arrives with Chris and his newly-minted girlfriend, Jerri (Laura Harring, here billed as "Herring," for some reason) in tow, and Laura immediately senses that something is off. Chris waves it off at first, all the better to hook up with Jerri in the tub and enjoy some grub. But after hours pass and there's still no grandma, even he has to admit something fishy's going on and the three go to take a look-see in the neighborhood. Cue Ricky, who attacks and stabs Chris, while the girls flee for their lives.
Meanwhile, after getting the idea that Lt. Connely has no intention of taking Ricky alive, Dr. Newbury steals his car and makes his way to Laura's grandmother's house, forcing the Lt. to call for a back-up ride. Newbury arrives shortly after Chris' attack and is stabbed himself by Ricky, after attempting to "talk him down." Yeah, that's always a good move.
After that, Ricky finally heads back to grandma's, where he takes out Jerri and terrorizes Laura within an inch of her life. Thankfully, Chris is still alive after all, and comes to save the day, shooting Ricky with a gun he found upstairs. Alas, Ricky is a tough customer to kill, and rebounds quickly, using the gun to choke Chris out. (We never discover whether he survives or not.)
Meanwhile, Laura has found a stick, which she uses to run through Ricky, just as the cops arrive. Lt. Connely finds a dying Newbury, who finally chills out and cracks a joke before kicking the bucket, and then proceeds to Laura's grandma's house, where he stumbles upon a devastated Laura, cowering in the dark.
The paramedics declare that they might just be able to save Ricky, as Lt. Connely comforts Laura and escorts her into his car, astonished that a blind woman could survive such an ordeal. "Merry Christmas," says she, as a tuxedo-ed Ricky finishes the thought with a "Happy New Year," thus implying that the connection is still intact.
Though a bit slow-moving at times, and dubiously having a lot of the murders occur off-screen, SNDN 3 is undeniably a hell of a lot better and competently made than the previous installment, if nowhere near as fun. It's not half bad, but it's not great, either, in spite of Hellman's declarations to the contrary, though I will allow that, considering the quick turnaround of the film, it is a hell of a lot better than it has a right to be under those circumstances.
On paper, it admittedly sounds fantastic. You've got veteran character actor Culp (TV's I Spy) as a sarcastic cop, three vets of David Lynch's work in Harring (Mulholland Drive), Beymer and Da Re (both of TV's Twin Peaks); and horror cult movie icon Moseley (Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2, The Devil's Rejects) as Ricky. You've got an old-school pro in the director's chair, and the script is not without a sense of humor.
But the sad truth is, it just falls a bit flat. Even the usually animated Moseley seems bored- it probably doesn't help that he only has two lines of dialogue in the entire movie- though the bit with him hitchhiking is a hoot, perhaps unintentionally. With the notable exception of Culp, who seems to be having grand old time, no one seems particularly happy to be there- although I'm guessing Da Re wasn't complaining about cuddling in a tub with a young, hot Harring- and, as a result, most of the performances are a bit meh.
Leading lady Scully, who would later appear in two more decent cult flicks, Best of the Best (with Eric Roberts and James Earl Jones) and Bloodsuckers (from cult director Ulli Lommel), before prematurely retiring from the business, isn't bad in a tricky role as a blind woman, but her character isn't the most likable creation in the world, either.
There's a very weird undercurrent of her possibly being into her brother- note how vicious she is towards Jerri and how jealous she is of him (who can blame her, with that glorious mane, lol) - which is also somewhat present in Chris as well, given that his girlfriend is kind of a dead ringer for his sister. In fact, and not for the first time, either, I thought Scully was Harring when I watched it after becoming aware of Lynch's work with the various actors here, and did the same thing upon re-watching it for the purposes of this review.
The weirdness doesn't stop there, either, as Dr. Newbury's relationship with Laura is also a bit questionable. Note the way he caresses her head in a scene early on when he is trying to talk her into another "dream session." It seems more like a seduction than the behavior of a professional.
I mean, you could well blame all of this on the actors in question- maybe Beymer made an acting choice to go in that direction, or he simply found Scully attractive IRL, and likewise, perhaps Scully, in turn, had her character being overprotective of her brother because he, as she states in the film, was "all she had" after the death of their parents in a plane crash. But there's no denying there's some odd psychological stuff going on here, and I'm not entirely sure it isn't intentional.
That said, it does admittedly make the proceedings slightly more enjoyable, especially for us armchair movie psychologists, so there's that. I just wish that the movie had a little more verve to it, and a little more enthusiasm from the participants. They could all learn a thing or two from Culp, who is the only one who really seems to get what type of film this should be.
Still, if you're a fan of the first two films in particular, you should definitely see this one, if only to finish off the main story-line from those films. Just keep in mind it's more along the lines of the first film than the second, a few amusing scenes notwithstanding. (I also enjoyed the bits with Culp's cop trying to hawk cell phones (!) to an un-amused Beymer's doctor and the bit where Ricky has dinner with grandma, with that ludicrous wool hat atop his salad bowl encased noggin, lol.)
As aforementioned, Gorson would go on to use a lot of his ideas from the discarded initial script for this film in the next installment, Silent Night, Deadly Night 4: Initiation, but the series would never return to the Ricky story-line, even though they clearly left the door open for the character to continue, which is too bad. Who knows? Maybe the character could come back in yet another low-budget sequel... perhaps with a returning Eric Freeman? Stranger things have happened!
Join me next time for my final review in the series, for 2012's much-belated follow-up, Silent Night, which is a very loose remake of the original. I might deliver it over the weekend, but if not, look for it on Monday, aka Christmas Eve. I might also try to sneak in a few new reviews over the weekend as well, as I've watched a few other Xmas-themed horror flicks over the last few weeks. See you when I see you... but know that I'll be watching you, just like Santa! 🎅😈💀
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