POLTERGEIST 3 (1988) **

Carol Anne (Heather O’Rourke) gets pawned off on her Aunt Pat (Nancy Allen) and Uncle Bruce (Tom Skerritt) and goes to stay with them in their big-ass skyscraper in Chicago.  It doesn’t take long for the demented Reverend Kane (Nathan Davis, a poor substitute for Julian Beck) to come looking for Carol Anne as he once again needs her to guide him “into the light”.  With the help of Tangina (Zelda Rubinstein), Pat and Bruce buckle down to go to the other side to find Carol Anne.

Everyone always talks about “The Poltergeist Curse” because of the deaths of many actors in the franchise.  This is the one most clearly affected by the curse since poor little Heather O’Rourke died during the making of the movie.  Because of that, a terrible pall hangs over the entire film.  Even if she had lived, Poltergeist 3 would’ve still been a lame sequel.  Since she died, it just adds an unpleasant air to the proceedings. 

Let’s talk about the good stuff first.  I really dig Tom Skerritt and Nancy Allen in this.  While Craig T. Nelson and JoBeth Williams are sorely missed, Skerritt and Allen have their own brand of chemistry that makes their scenes together fun to watch.  It’s just a shame they were stuck in a crappy Poltergeist sequel.  I also enjoyed a young Lara Flynn Boyle (in her film debut) as their spunky daughter. 

This is also the slickest looking film in the franchise.  Gone is the soft-focus Spielbergian feel of the first two movies.  The sleek, polished look compliments the skyscraper setting and helps to give this entry its own distinct vibe.  We also get a WTF moment when Boyle bursts through a husk of Rubinstein that qualifies as the flick’s lone oddball set piece.

That’s about it.

The big problem is that director Gary Sherman (who also directed the classic Vice Squad) only has one trick up his sleeve:  Mirror bullshit.  People look at their reflection and see something happening in the mirror before it happens in real life and/or a ghost that can only be seen in the mirror and not beside them.  That’s it.  This gag gets old fast and Sherman hammers it mercilessly into the ground even before the first act draws to a close. 

Seriously, you won’t want to look at a mirror for a week after you watch this.  Not because you’ll be scared.  You’ll just be sick of seeing mirrors. 

The ending is also hard to watch.  It feels rushed, almost as if it was hastily rewritten after O’Rourke’s death.  It’s also awfully anticlimactic.  The fact that they used a painfully obvious double for O’Rourke doesn’t help matters either.

The worst part of the movie though is the gratuitous shrink character played by Richard Fire.  He has got to be the most unlikeable, grating, annoying asshat to ever appear in a major horror franchise sequel.  I know he’s supposed to be the guy you love to hate, but he is so delusional, arrogant, condescending, and moronic that you just want to punch his stupid face every time he shows up.  Most of the blame should be diverted to Sherman and his co-writer Brian Taggert (who also wrote Wanted:  Dead or Alive with Sherman) for shamelessly stacking the deck against him and piling on repulsive trait after repulsive trait.  Fire was obviously a much better writer than actor as he also wrote the classic Henry:  Portrait of a Serial Killer.