Malevolence 3: Killer — Malevolence 3: Killer( Blu Ray & DVD)
As with the first two chapters in the series Mena directs, writes, scores & edits Malevolence 3: Killer- the whole thing picks up directly after the end of the first film, finding pain resistant killer Martin Bristol making his way to slightly more populated area. The tone, feel, unfold & look of the film is very reminiscent of the first Halloween film- as we find the boil suited killer stealing a van, then stalking & slashing a group of female teenagers & neighbourhood young girl. He does so mostly with a carving knife, with the soundtrack often jolting in a Halloween like manner- when the killer strikes, sudden rises, or appears- for the most part, Bristol's face is kept in the shadows, and we get a fair bit of killer POV shots.
On the plus side, Mena does manage to build quite an often taunt atmosphere, and you do feel for the lead female teens as they are stalked. Appearing as the grandmother of Martin Bristol is Adrienne Barbeau(The Fog, Escape From New York)- and it’s great to see her back in a genre film again, and really she is the most consistent player here. As mentioned the main teens are memorable enough, with their acting been fairly even. Sadly some of the smaller/ supporting actors are less effective, coming off as both hammy & amateurish- but if you stay focused on the unfolding plot, this element is only minor niggle.
Of the three films I say this is least original & effective. In the other two films, Mena managed to pull in his other horror film influences, and filter them out in a fairly balanced & original manner- sadly with Malevolence 3: Killer it often feels like a Halloween clone. It’s certainly worth seeing if you've seen the other two films, but as stand-alone it’s less satisfactory.
Extra wise we get a commentary track from Mena- here he discusses pretty much everything- discussing locations, actors, the film's production. As well as issues/ problems with the production- and one of the major issues was the sad passing on one of the film key actors just before filming was finished- so Mena had to do a lot of re-shooting/ re-editing with zero budget. Next, you get two featurettes, each of these run around the seven-minute mark- the first a generally behind scenes venture, and the second sees Mena discussing his creation of the soundtrack.
In conclusion Malevolence 3: Killer is still a lot better than most modern slashers- I just felt it was the lesser of the three films- due to the lack of originality, and effective ties into the other two films- but some of this could have be of course down to the major issues the film production had.