Media Blasters | Review by Dan Taylor
While
this flick is included in "The Lucio
Fulci Collection," it's important to
note that ZOMBIE 3 was actually completed
by Bruno Mattei (NIGHT OF THE ZOMBIES, RATS:
A NIGHT OF TERROR) after Fulci's principal
photography on the picture wrapped. Stories
differ as to why Mattei was brought in,
but if you're interested in renting something
called ZOMBIE 3 I'm guessing who did what
when really isn't that important!
Like any good zombie flick
worth half its budget, Z3 starts out with
(cue synth music) SCIENCE GONE AWRY! Sure
enough, there's a guy in a glass chamber
who bears a striking resemblance to David
Carradine as Grasshopper until he starts
to throw up blood, mutates and breaks out
of the flimsy zombie containment chamber.
After some "Death 1 Compound"
gets stolen by terrorists, I think we're
all a little surprised to discover that
it's more deadly than they imagined. So,
let me get this straight... you called something
"Death 1 Compound," yet it's deadlier
than the name implies??? Well, I have to
admit that anything that creates that much
billowy smoke and bad synth music rarely
amounts to anything good.
Those of you who have seen
a zombie flick (or ten) would probably expect
the pesky terrorists to show up at a hospital
and infect everybody. Apparently unable
to afford a hospital set, the producers
substitute an old motel. Well, it's not
just a motel, it's more like a resort filled
with automatic weapons and flamethrowers.
After the initial zombie attack,
some random military personnel is sent in
to the Zombie Zone to wipe out the minimum
wage zombies that are still causing problems
around the motel. One big question we were
left pondering: How did the resort fall
into such ruin in the space of a week? Were
the phone lines, furniture and plants infected
with Death One, too?
Alright, alright, I'm nitpicking.
Guilty as charged! What you want is the
details, details, details that will help
you decide between ZOMBIE 3 and, say, ZOMBIE
4.
You can rest assured that
they've dug up the ol' blind black DJ who
figures into the flick's "shock"
ending. The zombies are not your typically
plodding passive zombies who're just waiting
to get blasted in their empty heads. Nope,
we've got a little bit of machete wielding
from our undead, and there's even zombie
birds, a zombie baby, camouflage zombies,
pajama-clad zombies, an inspired flying
zombie head and more fog, moaning, groaning
and plodding synth music than you can shake
a zombie at.
In other words, I've seen
worse.
