Final Destination 3

If you are familiar with the first two movies of the series, and if you liked them, then you will be very comfortable with the newest variation on a theme. If you haven't seen them, and you like horror movies, they are definitely worth checking out. The premise behind the movie is that if you cheat death, and mind you death does NOT like being cheated (DEATH GETS PISSED, no one does it better than Richard Pryor), death will come track down you and get you (and it won't be pretty, and they will film it and after awhile release it in a full-screen and wide-screen version, buy the wide-screen version). Isn't that the way death works in the real world? I think this is the strongest entry in the series. The actors/actresses are very capable, and there are not a lot of minor subplots present to get in the way of the main plot. Whoever the writer is that thought up the actual death sequences might want to get out of the house a little more, some of these are real mind benders. And given what it is, a horror movie aimed at the teenage/horror movie audience, this movie is a little gem in its own way. Final Destination 3 has it's own black sense of humor, and the director had the good sense to hold back and let the few jokes/jolts in the movie to be really good ones. Sometimes more is not always better, and this director, James Wong who also was one of the writers, seems to know the difference. James Wong also directed the first Final Destination and had a hand in the newest version of Willard. The movie is very graphic, though the gore sequences tend to be very quick and work quite well within the framework of the movie, not for the squeamish though.

The DVD of Final Destination 3 is a very nice release, the commentaries go into great detail about how they actually made the movie (and I was shocked at how much CGI was used in the production that goes completely unnoticed while watching the movie). New Line is making a big deal about the interactive part of the DVD where you can change the plot. This might be interesting to someone that has not seen the movie, but I found it more annoying than anything. I believe the lit bits were added JUST to entice people to buy the DVD and were never intended to be part of the original film (though they were shot at the same time). There are several making-of featurettes and a little sequence in which Roger Ebert talks about teenage horror movies in general that is interesting, and this feature is almost as much fun as the movie. The DVD has DTS sound as one of the options, and a little seven minute animated short called It's All Around You which looks something you might find on the internet. The short ‘s subject matter is about what are the odds of dying in some specific ways, somewhat relevant to the plot of Final Destination 3.

The death sequences in Final Destination 3 remind me of Rube Goldberg's cartoons, where a long chain of usually unrelated events are hooked up end on end. There is an example of a Rube Goldberg cartoon on how to sharpen a pencil at http://www.rube-goldberg.com/html/pencil_sharpener.htm if you would like to see one.

Also a Tex Avery cartoon springs to mind, MGM's Bad Luck Blackie made in 1949 (I found an online copy at http://video.google.com but I am not sure how legal it is). The cartoon has it's own inner logic taken to the nth degree, and it sticks to it. There are variations on one basic gag, a dog is picking on a little kitten, and whenever this happens a black cat crosses the dog's path, and then something bad happens. The incidents start small and get bigger and bigger as the cartoon goes on (starts off with a flower pot falling on the dogs head and ends up with an airplane, bus, and ship dropping out of the sky), a very beautiful piece of work and well worth tracking down. In the same way Final Destination 3 has it own peculiar inner logic, and the little death sequences must have been hell to plan out and execute, but the inner logic makes the film much more enjoyable to watch.

You can write James Harper at movielover77061@yahoo.com