Warlock 3: The End Of Innocence
Julian Sands found himself in a pretty sweet situation becoming the franchise villain in a high level horror series, that of a Warlock (name never given) on a crusade to bring the world to an end, annihilating everyone in his path en route to an apocalyptic finale. Part 2 was seen as a step down from the original, enough so to compel Sands to move on with his career and not consider any more offers to play the role again, but he still left an indelible legacy on horror / sci fi in the process with many moments of pure charisma all while playing pure evil. Regardless, they moved forward with a Part 3, recasting the role with bad guy character actor Bruce Payne (best known as the lead villain in Passenger 57 and as the evil Immortal with a Christian gimmick in Highlander 4), given the unenviable task of following an underrated actor in perhaps his most iconic role. Payne does succeed in bringing an understated nuance to the proceedings, engaging in subversion tactics which Sands was never allowed to do. Meanwhile, in another preproduction meeting, knowing that the new actor might have a little trouble getting across, the decision was made to have him square off against a legendary horror movie superstar and one of the most revered of The Scream Queens in none other than Ashley Laurence, whose Kirsty Cotton had remained a solid thorn in the side of Hellraiser’s Pinhead and now was freshened up and pretty again to play the main heroine and target of the new Warlock mainly due to her being the last of her good witch bloodline, with some interesting rules in place to make this compelling, the most notable being that all of her close friends must be convinced to verbally surrender their loyalty to Kirsty thus making his conquest more spiritually sound. It appears to be a tough sell since Kirsty’s circle of friends (all of whom are about 10 years younger than Ashley Laurence) revolves entirely around HER, including a boyfriend with severe daddy issues, a goth S&M couple into having kinky sex with each other but only each other, Kirsty’s best friend (Boti Bliss) who fools around with her own amateur witchcraft practices (and provides another interesting but only briefly used subtext about how a silly young girl who “dabbles” in witchcraft can at least temporarily engage in a spellcasting duel with New Warlock) and of course, the male BFF who not only holds a long standing love of Kirsty, but is forced to look on while she carries on in front of him with her REAL boyfriend while he pines and then retires to his room to masturbate to a purloined piece of her clothing. Yes, this crew all live in the same house together, but when Kirsty gets a letter telling her that she has inherited a crusty old mansion in the northern part of Ireland, none of her loyal friends feel interested enough to join her on the long, boring trip, a smart move since the (new) Warlock has been secretly living there and waiting for the last of the bloodline to show up for sacrificial purposes. He entertains himself by slaughtering a hapless handyman who has come to do basic repair services before Kirsty finally arrives, slowing the movie down while she wanders aimlessly through the house, and then suddenly, her squad arrives, having changed their minds and followed her out there because they all love her so much, which is perfect for Warlock 2.0 but now he must get a better look, using infiltration to pose as an “architect” having a look at the place and then moving stealthily amongst them, borrowing pages from the playbook of Billy Zane’s Collector in Demon Knight who used temptation and false promises to get what he wanted which likewise was essentially consent from the victims themselves to give up their souls. New Warlock uses the tactic of isolating Kirsty’s friends to have long conversations with them, even acting as a counselor to her boyfriend about his Daddy issues. But The New Warlock’s piece de resistance of psychological manipulation and humiliation comes with the pathetic Male BFF, sadly watching his beloved with her REAL boyfriend all the time before he’s easily suckered into becoming New Warlock’s Renfield, pulling off random little favors on New Warlock’s request in order to better play his hand all while promising Male BFF that he’s going to help him get Kirsty despite his doubts and insecurities about ever being a real man period. All of this is to set up each of Kirsty’s friends “giving up” on her, although her boyfriend has to be submitted to becoming a piece of fried barbeque before huffing out a pained consent with his last breath. All of this leads up to Kirsty vs New Warlock, a ridiculous and poorly staged soiree that in a particularly stupid touch, winds up seeing Kirsty wield a dolly as a deadly weapon against the terrified Warlock, a shocking sight since dolls are not usually known to be used that way before New Warlock turns into a CGI Moloch and then it’s done. As said, the sight of New Warlock successfully infiltrating a group of friends and then using elements of seduction differs vastly from Sands’ character, who never pretended to be anything other than his own evil self and was just a charismatic killing machine but the thought that he wasn’t allowed to personally take it in the direction seen here is pretty saddening despite the game effort by his successor…
7/10