callanvass A reporter named John Baxter (Tony Roberts) moves to Long Island, into the ominous house where many unexplainable, supernatural occurrences have commenced. He and his wife have separated, and Baxter is not a believer, but peculiar things keep happening around him. The people he cares about die, and there seems to be no end to it. I enjoyed the second prequel (I mean sequel, whatever you wanna call it) more than the first movie, but it wasn't exactly clamoring for another installment. But we got one, and 4 more crappy DTV sequels, and even a remake as well. In fact… another movie about Amityville is heading to theaters later on this year. This was filmed in 3D. Naturally, it doesn't have any effect while watching it on DVD, but that was the big selling point back then. This movie never bored me, but it's inexplicably stupid. How much has to commence, for Tony Robert's character to realize that he should get the heck out of there? Everything weird happens when he moved there. It things happened to me like they did in this movie, for example. A haunted elevator, my daughter died, and my partner got burned alive, by being trapped in a car accident. I wouldn't wanna investigate the paranormal activities. I would be long gone! I also didn't have any proper heroes. Almost everybody in this movie is virtually unlikable. Tony Roberts plays a selfish imbecile, who is arrogantly oblivious to everything. I had no sympathy for him. Tess Harper (Nancy Baxter) is quite pretentious and claims Roberts is egotistical in this movie, to her own daughter. The subplot between her and Tony Roberts grated me. I understood that warning her daughter to stay away from the house was needed, but she was just as bad. Lori Loughlin plays it low key. It wasn't a great performance, but she's beautiful to look at. Meg Ryan's cheeky charm was just great. She had a very small part as Loughlin's friend, and she gives the best performance(!) Not much gore here. The burning sequence is harsh and quite disturbing, but the laughable looking skeleton hinders some of the impact. We also get the fly routine from the original, and a hilariously dated looking creature at the end, who spews a fireball. The effects were quite shoddyFinal Thoughts: Never boring, but too stupid to enjoy fully. If you're gonna watch an Amityville movie, I'd pick the second movie, or the remake. 4/10

RecceR The third installment to the Amityville movies finds a non-believer, John Baxter, moving into the infamous house to prove he does not believe the stories. Well, everyone who seems to come in contact with him and the house begins to die in bizarre ways. This movie was not horrible, but it just wasn't that great, even compared to the second installment. There were a few moments that were very good. I don't want to spoil the scene, but there is a particular moment that is very eerie and bone-chilling. One of the main issues with this movie is that it focused too much on what the evil force was behind the house. That is the same thing that hurt the second installment. The subtle creepiness of the original is what made it work so well, but this one seemed like it wanted to be a crappy Poltergeist sequel and fell flat. It was also odd that characters in the movie acknowledged the DeFeo murders, ignoring the Lutz family all-together along with the name change of the first family in Amityville II (Motelli). My only guess is that they were trying to suggest the first two movies were in-fact movies and this one was "real," or they just forgot what continuity was. The acting was not that great, too many awkward pauses and poor delivery. I won't say this was the worst horror movie I've ever seen, but it is definitely up there. Watch at your own risk, or watch to make fun of it.

Michael_Elliott Amityville 3 (1983) * 1/2 (out of 4) Due to a lawsuit between the Lutz family and producer Dino DeLaurentis, this third film in the AMITYVILLE series wasn't allowed to be considered a "sequel" (WTF??) so there's not much mention of the original events portrayed in the previous two films. This "new" story has an investigative reporter (Tony Roberts) and his assistant (Candy Clark) busting a couple con artists working inside the Amityville house. After the bust the reporter decides to buy the house since he is separating from his wife (Tess Harper) and sure enough strange events begin to happen. I think the biggest question one must ask when it comes to AMITYVILLE 3 is why on Earth anyone would purchase the house to begin with. Not too long ago I read a pretty good interview with director Fleischer where he went into great detail about the production history of this film and reading his comments made it appear that the film never had a chance. From the pre-filming lawsuits to the various issues while filming, this movie seemed doomed to fail and it pretty much put the nail in the coffin of the franchise before it eventually got started again thanks to TV and DTV movies. The biggest problem with this third movie is that there doesn't seem to be a reason for it being made. I'm also not quite sure who they were making this film for either. The movie was rated PG and it's clear that 1983 was a time for slashers so you pretty much alienated the majority of the horror crowd by going with a clear movie. There are a couple death scenes but they are done without much use of special effects and none of them are overly thrilling. The haunted aspects of the story also come across quite bland and they're certainly never scary. The film was originally shot in 3-D but I could only few the 2-D version and it was rather strange to see that there's really not too much stuff flying straight at the camera. The opening credits obviously do and there are a few other moments but for the most part the film is perfectly viewable flat. In that previously mentioned interview, Fleischer also makes it clear that the majority of the people working on the film had no idea how to properly use 3-D. Roberts is an actor I always enjoy watching and while this material certainly isn't his Woody Allen glory days, I still enjoyed seeing him here. Harper seems incredibly bored with her part and I guess you can't really blame her. Clark has a pretty big role here but her acting leaves a little to be desired. The film is probably best remembered for featuring a young Meg Ryan who gets to show off that memorable laugh. There are certainly much worse movies out there but there are very few where you watch them and ask yourself what the entire point was. I'm sure money was the main goal but the producers didn't get that and the viewer didn't get any sort of entertainment.

Toronto85 Amityville 3-D takes us once again to the infamous haunted house where evil surrounds all who enter. In this one, a journalist played by Tony Roberts buys the house. The minute he does, people around him start dying in mysterious ways. This was the first Amityville to trail away from the "true" stories of the Lutz and DeFeo families. This here is all fiction. Of course, many could argue that parts one and two were fiction as well. I actually enjoyed Amityville 3-D a bit more than part II.The acting in this is pretty bad all around. Meg Ryan debuts, but only has a few lines. Nothing much. The demon in the house looked sort of good (for a 1983 film), but we don't see it until the end. I have to say I would have liked to see it in 3-D years ago. 3-D was the big thing in the early eighties. Jaws and Friday the 13th both used that format around this time.The 3-D objects include 3-D flies, 3-D swordfish, even 3-D spit. The film moves at a very slow pace and I lost interest in it quickly. It didn't do well at the box office, which is why the rest of the sequels were made for TV and straight to video.4/10