Wishmaster 3: Beyond the Gates of Hell (2001)

Waste of time

An unexpected masterpiece

It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

Look, no one is saying "Wishmaster" is among the great horror series, but it has some fun moments, and I count myself as a fan. I enjoyed Wishmaster, and loved Wishmaster 2. I was excited to see Wishmaster 3, though naturally I expected some dropping off in quality. (Yeah I know. I am probably way too tolerant of cheap direct-to-video horror flicks.) Unfortunately, Wishmaster 3 doesn't even follow the admittedly vague Wishmaster rules. People make wishes, but then the Wishmaster basically just kills them. Example: a guy wishes for two hot girls to be in love with him - they turn up, kiss him, then kill him. How does that fulfill his wish? Heck, I can think of ten ways in which having two hot girls who love you can be transformed into something horrible and murderous - but the writers of Wishmaster 3 couldn't. Pfui.The villain is not ominous at all. I miss the guy from Wishmaster 2 - man he could ROCK a creepy grin.The whole show is crippled by an idiot subplot in which the girl heroine can't bring herself to say "I love you" to her boyfriend. Even though she sleeps with the guy, she is tagged as having "intimacy issues". Really? The only bright point in the whole film is that when it's over and the evil djinn returned to his gem, all the people he killed aren't magically resurrected. Man I HATED that in the other films. Sadly it's not enough to make up for the suckitude otherwise.Well, on to Wishmaster 4. Here's hoping.

The Wishmaster series continues its descent into the depths of direct to video hell, as the movies got cheaper and less fun.The premise of this movie is that the Gem containing the Djinn is now found in cheap box instead of a nice statue of Ahura-Mazda. Also lost in the budget cutting was Andrew Divoff, the guy who gave the Wishmaster all his menace in the previous two films.In this one, the Wishmaster is released by yet another troubled hot chick. (Seriously, I guess if a guy ever released the Wishmaster, the movie would be over in ten minutes after he wished for a keg, a million bucks and some hot babes!) While he is killing time, the new Wishmaster clumsily bullies his victims into making foolish wishes. (Again, Divoff's version was much more sinister in his manipulations.) I'm guessing they filmed this on a real college campus, because they have a lot of footage of people running about doing that setting.The plot also involves invoking the Archangel Michael to help defeat the Wishmaster by bringing a sword that can kill it. Or something. Just tricking it with a cleverly worded third wish wasn't going to cut it anymore.

For some odd reason these Wishmaster movies are depending more on the gore and the shockfest rather than the actual story which could be a good scare. The first Wishmaster was actually entertaining, the second was over all watchable if not too silly, the fourth is just alright, but this movie was just stupid. If not for the bad acting, bad script, bad direction, bad... OK actually this movie is just plain bad. I loved the girl they picked out for the lead role, A.J. Cook, this girl could win an Oscar; OK, not so much as my movie poster expresses more emotion than she did throughout this movie. Jason Connery, the new Djinn, this Simon Pegg wanna be, he just doesn't work as a villain and isn't scary or intimidating by any means. Everything about this film was just stupid and seriously just should not have been made, but if you would like a brief summary, I will always provide.Diana is a college student struggling with a painful past of slow motion voices of her parents burning in a car wreck and dying. In the present day, she has a cute dumb steroid loving boyfriend, Greg, her cute superstitious blonde friend, Katie, and Katie's stupid hot sarcastic jerk boyfriend, Billy. Oh, life is good, until she discovers a box that she takes to her professor and it releases the Djinn! The Djinn takes form of the student horny professor and is now after Diana to make her wishes. But of course she's stubborn and just lets him kill all of her friends except for Greg who has taken on the spirit of the Puzuzu... oh, wait wrong movie... St. Michael the Archangel and talks in a slightly deeper voice to Diana on how they can defeat the Djinn, too bad he's just a little sexist and doesn't have any faith that they can defeat the Djinn.This is a bad movie all around. I love horror movies, even sometimes if they don't make sense, but this is a movie that I was expecting to at least try a little considering the first Wishmaster had a decent script and a good cast. You can see why the original cast hasn't returned for this cruddy movie. I just love the ending line "I love you", OK, I was expecting when Diana runs up to her boyfriend Greg after he's back to normal she says "I love you" he says "I love you too", it would have been great if she added "yeah, I'm pregnant", and he jumps over the building and kills himself. That would have been a better ending to this crapfest of a movie. Believe me this is just a movie you do not want to see, it's stupid and a waste of time.1/10

I won't watch this film without the sound turned off, the stereo pounding out punk rock and at least a fifth of whiskey in my hand. However, the beautiful creature suit for the djinn itself held out well enough to be used again in Wishmaster 4, so at least the creature effects crew and I did our job well. Say that about the writers and actors, if you can keep a straight face. This film bought me an air conditioner for my car, and for that I love it. But really folks, we came to see the djinn, not the sexual-predator college professor he was pretending to be. Only five minutes of screen time for my beautiful djinn suit...sickening. Josh and the guys who made that monster so real and so scary, we were all disappointed that you almost never see the djinn in his real form. I agree, the new actor couldn't hold a candle to the original, but hey, the new guy worked for A lot less money. I'd tell you to buy this direct to video (as part of the collection) but A: I don't even own it myself, and B: I don't get any royalties. This is schlock worthy of Troma (who are also a great bunch of guys to work with!). My vote is 10 for the crew and 1 for the writers and actors.