The demon from his past that Leo DiCaprio oh-so-desperately wants you to forget - Critters 3!!

Ahhh, Critters 3.  The point at which the most successful Gremlins ripoff franchise went direct-to-video, and the point at which it fully embraced being an all-out cheesefest.  The previous movies may not have been Shakespeare in the park, but by and large took themselves as seriously as movies about tiny aliens with the ability to shoot quills from their asses could be.  This one is goofy to the core, and gloriously stupid.  Stupid movies make me happy, so I knew this one would be a good time from the outset when it gave me something like 5 separate coincidences that all led to the main characters being together in a completely different locale than the film starts out at.  More on that later.

That, and the movie stars Leonardo DiCaprio.  Yup - THAT Leonardo DiCaprio.  You know, the one who critics repeatedly cream themselves over and who draws comparisons to Jack Nicholson, Robert Duvall and other great actors from past generations.  Me?  Eh, take a guess.  In keeping with my known M.O. of being an annoying contrarian, I think the guy is overrated.  More than anything else  he just seems to have the best damn agent in Hollywood more who GETS him these plum roles.  But that's neither here nor there.  It's always interesting to see big, popular movie stars of today in their formative, nonauspicious roles of yesteryear, and that's one of the big boons of spending the $0.98 for a DVD copy of Critters 3.

Other interesting trivia data to impart: this film was shot back-to-back with its immediate follow-up, and while on first glance the two movies could not possibly be more different, we get a sequence that does a pretty commendable job tying the two projects together.  The movie was also directed by Kristine Petersen, a student of the Roger Corman zero-budget school of filmmaking who also helmed 1990's Body Chemistry, a flick that used to get a TON of airplay on the cable movie channels in the early '90s.  As a 12-year-old first discovering that girls weren't just weird-looking boys, let's just say that I used to really enjoy that movie.  Like, really enjoy it.  A lot.

THE MOVIE!!

Meet this flick's nondescript Critters familial unit - the Menges.  There's father Clifford, star character and teenage daughter Annie, and Bart Simpson-esque son Johnny.  Much like the Browns from the first two films, these people aren't annoying, which is always a welcome plus.  The script gives us some reasons to like them - the mother died two years ago, and we get the sense that these people genuinely like each other.  In addition, Aimee Brooks, who plays Annie, has become something of a minor scream queen in the 21st century, having appeared in her fair share of crappy horror flicks including Monster Man, The Hillside Strangler and The Mangler Reborn.  If that's not a resume worthy of the Hollywood Walk of Fame, I don't know what is.

Anyway, we soon get our first truly gasp-worthy moment of the film, as the family pulls over in a rest area after a tire flattens.  Annie and Johnny start playing with a frisbee before being interrupted by Leonardo DiCaprio, who warns young Johnny not to go down into a nearby ravine because there might be "wild animals or shit" down there.  For what it's worth, he isn't bad in this movie as "Josh," the kinda-sorta love interest for Annie who also happens to be the stepson of the big, nasty human villain real estate developer guy who becomes great fodder for the monsters later in the film.  Random trivia fact: Cary Elwes actually turned down the role of Josh.  I had no idea that this role was so desired by young actors in the early '90s.

Without warning, Charlie - still played by Don Opper - bursts into the movie.  Like, literally.  Jumping out of the cold, hard ground, even.  He explains to the kids all about the Crites and his past a big, badass monster hunter, which is helped by his 56K cache memory bringing up videos as visual aids in the form of flashbacks.  You can probably guess what I'm thinking, already...but this guy is still no almighty hero character.  In fact, he's quite abrasive.  What this scene accomplishes?  While Charlie regales them with the story of Critters 1 and 2, one of the remaining Crites (as it turns out, this rest area is near Grover's Bend, the site of the first two films) sneaks into our main family's vehicle and lays some eggs.

The plot magically warps forward until Clifford, Annie and Johnny are back in Los Angeles.  The rest of the film takes place in this shoddy, warn-down apartment complex (but not one owned by Paul Christy, sadly).  For what it's worth, this series has done a good job not feeling like "same old shit," placing the first film in a rural setting, the second in a town, and this one in a large city.  While the plot remains basically the same, at least the scenery changes.  As it turns out, the kids are being dropped off here to stay with their grandparents (the grandmother is played by Frances Bay, who has had TONS of supporting roles in fairly big films over the years) before the father takes off for Chicago.  The more you know.

And we get our first kill!  It's the Guido caretaker of the apartment building, and witnessing how this guy both looks and talks like Doogie Howser's brother, it's a cheer-out-loud moment watching the guy get brutalized in the laundry room.  As for the makeup effects department, the Critters in this film look about as good as they did in the last film, which is pretty f'n good.  In the end, it doesn't really matter, because puppets > CGI any ol' day of the week.

Almost immediately following this, we get a near-miss that I, for one, desperately miss was a bullseye, as the Crites attempt to kill the movie's clueless fatass character.  I've seen and liked this lady in some other movies, but here..."abrasive" doesn't do it justice.  I don't know what it is, but I just have an intense hatred for any woman wearing curlers and flowered dresses.  Maybe it's just me.  Where was I?  Oh yeah - Annie hears Fat Lady screaming and saves her life.  We get the requisite argument between Annie and Clifford (that's the father, for those keeping score) here where the parental figure in a horror movie doubts the horrific story that their child is feeding them.  However, most movies that feature this trope don't feature the clueless parent immediately getting peppered with tiny aliens' sleep-inducing poison quills.  Long live Critters 3!

Hey, remember that Leonardo DiCaprio was in this movie?  Well, he was, and in one of those mystical movie coincidences, his evil stepdad is actually the landlord of the building.  After attempting to call Guido caretaker and getting no answer, he decides to drive over to the place and evict the tenants.  Seems like a sound enough business proposition to me.  What solidifies this guy's position as the one that you most definitely want to see dead (even moreso than flowered dress Fat Lady) is two factors: (1) his moustache - anybody in a movie with sleazy, wispy-thin upper lipular facial hair is one that needs to vanish from my screen, and (2) the fact that he throws around dialogue like "I'm going to evict these people, and you're going to help me, sport!" to DiCaprio.  I've got to hand it to William Dennis Hunt (who also had a supporting role in Dr. Giggles) - he plays an excellent dislikable asshat.

The movie obliges our wishes, as Josh and his stepfather arrive at the apartment complex and the douche stepdad bites it soon enough, leading up to Josh's reunion with Annie.  I didn't mention it before, but there's supposed to be this romantic tension between the two characters.  Admittedly, Leo and Aimee Brooks had a lot of chemistry together as performers, so this aspect of the plot comes off as way better than it should.  The remaining characters soon begin barricading themselves inside various apartment buildings as the Crites begin attacking with more voracity.  Meanwhile, Johnny activates the communicator that Charlie gave him earlier in the movie, and you know what that means.  Shudder.

OK, from this point on, the movie becomes pretty repetitive - various threats being quelled by the plucky hero characters' ability to hide and pick off a few of the Critters at random intervals.  However, there are two sequences that really jumped out at me that I need to discuss at length.

(1) This movie's "comedic" Critters eating sequence.  The first two movies both featured scenes involving the Crites finding some locale where plenty of food is just laying about and snacking down.  This one, though, is quite simply NEVER-ENDING.  One Critter eats beans, complete with the ever-so-funny flatulence take.  Another mows down dish soap.  And the subtitles go on in some nonstop loop.  I realize that these movies are supposed to be goofy, but this was pushing it.

(2) OK, there's a fairly irrelevant character in this movie named Marcia (played by Katherine Cortez) who is basically the assistant maintenance person in the apartment complex.  Needing more subplots, it's implied that Clifford harbors some feelings for her, and throughout the movie, she exhibits some slight motherly behavior towards Annie.  Late in the movie, Marcia volunteers to climb down the side of the complex in order to reach a nearby pay phone.  She slips, with the cable that she was walking on tying around her ankle in the process, dropping her until she is mere inches away from the ground - and only a few feet away from the pay phone.  She swings and attempts to reach it once.  And again.  And again.  And again.  The action even cuts away to the remaining survivors and the Cirtters a few times...and then back to Marcia and this oh-so-amusing game of Pit and the Pendulum.  Yikes.

Just when all appears lost, we hear the familiar asshole-ish "Tarzan" yell, and Charlie arrives on the scene, blowing several of the Crites to bits with his energy weapon and causing the five fans of this series to groan.  The movie attempts to pad out its ending for another ten minutes, but what more do you need to know about this section of the movie?  Charlie arrives, kills the remaining Crites, and all is well.

Yes, folks, we even get another Wayne's World-approved Mega Happy Ending.  I realize that this reference is probably getting old, but what are you gonna do.  I'll take these endings over the dreary, depressing, M. Night Shyamalanadingdong "twist" endings we get with most modern-day horror films any day.  This particular ending has some conflagration of happy events - Leo asks Annie out to a movie, Clifford (who I just now realized is a railroad worker) decides to take a job at the local phone company and stay with his family, and evil stepfather's widowed wife (who seems remarkably upbeat despite her husband having been eaten by space carnivores) tells the tenants that they will be put up in hotels until the apartment building is fixed.  All it's missing is Wayne and Garth waving their fingers and the screen dissolving away.

 However, it's not quite AS happy as that, as Critters 3 contains something MOST unexpected - a sequence that takes place while the ending credits are flashing away.  Charlie is combing through the wreckage of the apartment building, and finds two Crite eggs in a washing machine.  He is ready to destory them when he is contacted by Ug, the interstellar bounty hunter who partnered with Charlie in the previous movie.  This also means that Terrence Mann is just as prolific as Don Opper in the Critters series.  The Intergalactic Council (which sounds impressive enough to capitalize) has decreed that no species can be killed off to extinction, and that they are sending a space pod to Charlie's present location.  Charlie, in turn, is to place the remaining Crite eggs into the pod and await further instruction.  I've got to say, this has me curious as to where this is going.

Final thoughts: Despite the two AFOREMENTIONED never-ending padding sequences, I enjoyed this movie on the stupid entertainment level.  It's short, sweet and decidedly thoughtless, featuring a couple of genuinely likable characters and good performances from Aimee Brooks and Frances Bay (despite the fact that the latter speaks something like 50 words).  Even if you ARE looking at this movie from the stuffy English major standpoint, however, you probably won't outright hate the film, as Brooks saves the movie from being a total trainwreck.  It's difficult to explain...you'll probably realize how dumb the movie is, but you'll like her enough that you won't want to outright savage it.  Me?  I got to watch Leo DiCaprio act all teen angsty and bitchy, and I got to see a guy who looks like a taller version of John Waters get his throat bitten open by a puppet.  On those merits - recommended, brutha.

*** out of ****.

P.S. - Considering what Aimee Brooks grew up to look like, I think Leo really missed out...

 Eat your heart out, Oscar nominee.