Prehysteria! 3 (1995) poster

Prehysteria! 3 (1995)

Rating:


USA. 1995.

Crew

Director – Julian Breen [David DeCoteau], Screenplay – Michael Davis & Noel Ruttenberg, Story – Brent Friedman, Producer – Karen L. Spencer, Photography – James Lawrence Spencer, Original Music – Richard Band, Adapted by Michael Wetherwax, Visual Effects – AlchemyFX (Supervisors – David Allen & Chris Endicott), Special Effects Supervisor – Wendy Grossberg, Creature Effects – Mark Rappaport, Puppet Sequences Supervised by Jesse H. Long, Production Design – Milo. Production Company – Moonbeam Entertainment.

Cast

Whitney Anderson (Ella MacGregor), Bruce Weitz (Uncle Hal MacGregor), Fred Willard (Thomas MacGregor), Dave Buzzotta (Heath MacGregor), Pam Matteson (Michelle MacGregor), Matt Letscher (Needlemeyer), John Fujioka (Mr Yamamoto), Raymond O’Connor (Stutts)


Plot

Young Ella MacGregor is a Scottish culture freak whose greatest desire is to play the great Scottish game of golf in the British Open. Her father owns a mini-putt golf course but it is about to be bought out by her golf champion uncle Hal for sale to the Japanese. The baby dinosaurs then fall off the back of a truck. They help Ella rebuild the mini-putt course, which she then promotes as Dino-Putt and turns into a successful enterprise. Uncle Hal is determined to obtain the course at all costs and begins to emplpy ruthless methods.


This is the third and best of Charles Band and Moonbeam Entertainment’s Prehysteria! films. This is not saying much because the other films – Prehysteria! (1993) and Prehysteria! 2 (1994) – were dire. For the most part, Prehysteria! 3 is business as was usual with the rest of these films. Behind the pseudonym of Julian Breen, is David DeCoteau, the director of numerous low-budget films, including Creepozoids (1987), Sorority Babes at the Slimeball Bowl-O-Rama (1987) and the The Brotherhood series.

Even though one is used to Mark Rappaport’s pathetically immobile dinosaur puppet effects by now through the Prehysteria! and other Moonbeam films, the scenes watching the dinosaurs working as chefs and cashiers, pulling Tonka toy trucks filled with rocks and only moving by being rocked on wires are embarrassing. There are inane attempts made to use them for the purposes of lame slapstick humour – the film’s absolute low point has them engaging in a game of Charades to impart vital information to Whitney Anderson.

On the plus side, Prehysteria! 3 does have an eccentric sense of humour that, if it is not the saving grace of the film, does at least make a bad effort occasionally amusing. The film is at its most amusing when it starts throwing in references to other films. “I love the smell of astroturf in the morning,” sleazes brownnosing caddy Matt Letscher. Although the film’s most amusing point is when father Fred Willard reviews a videotape of his losing game, which turns into an amusing parody of the courtroom review of the Zapruder film in JFK (1991). The film also cheekily names the two bullying caddies that aid Letscher, Bush and Dole. For some reason the film features much emphasis on Scottish culture – although it is not clued up enough to know what haggis is made of or that Edinburgh is not pronounced with a hard ‘g’.

David DeCoteau’s other films of genre interest are:– Dreamaniac (1986), Nightmare Sisters (1987), Creepozoids (1987), Sorority Babes at the Slimeball Bowl-O-Rama (1987) Dr Alien/I Was a Teenage Sex Maniac (1988), Murder Weapon (1990), Puppetmaster III: Toulon’s Revenge (1991), Beach Babes from Beyond (1993), Test Tube Teens from the Year 2000 (1994), Blonde Heaven (1995), Beach Babes 2: Cave Girl Island (1996), Bikini Goddesses (1996), Lurid Tales: The Castle Queen (1996), Petticoat Planet (1996), Prey of the Jaguar (1996), The Journey: Absolution (1997), Shrieker (1997), Skeletons (1997), Beach Babes from Beyond 2 (1998), Curse of the Puppet Master (1998), Frankenstein Reborn (1998), The Killer Eye (1998), Talisman (1998), Alien Arsenal (1999), Ancient Evil: Scream of the Mummy (1999), Witchhouse (1999), The Brotherhood (2000), Frankenstein and the Wolfman Reborn (2000), Prison of the Dead (2000), Voodoo Academy (2000), Final Stab/Final Scream/Scream 4 (2001), The Frightening (2001), The Brotherhood 2: Young Warlocks (2001), The Brotherhood 3: Young Demons (2002), Wolves of Wall Street (2002), Leeches (2003), Speed Demon (2003), Ring of Darkness (2004), The Sisterhood (2004), Brotherhood IV: The Complex (2005), Killer Bash (2005), Witches of the Caribbean (2005), Beastly Boyz (2006), Grizzly Rage (2007), The Raven (2007), House of Usher (2008), Alien Presence (2009), The Brotherhood V: Alumni (2009), The Brotherhood VI: Initiation (2009), Nightfall (2009), The Pit & the Pendulum (2009), Son of a Witch (2009), Stem Cell (2009), 1313: Giant Killer Bees (2010), Puppet Master: Axis of Evil (2010), A Dream Within a Dream (2011), 1313: Haunted Frat (2011), 1313: Actor Slash Model (2011), 1313: Boy Crazies (2011), 1313: Wicked Stepbrother (2011), 1313: Bermuda Triangle (2012), 1313: Bigfoot Island (2012), 1313: Cougar Cult (2012), 1313: Frankenqueen (2012), 1313: Hercules Unbound (2012), 1313: Night of the Widow (2012), 1313: UFO Invasion (2012), A Halloween Puppy (2012), Immortal Kiss: Queen of the Night (2012), Santa’s Summer House (2012), Snow White: A Deadly Summer (2012), 2: Voodoo Academy (2012), Hansel & Gretel: Warriors of Witchcraft (2013), My Stepbrother is a Vampire (2013), A Talking Cat (2013), A Talking Pony (2013), 3 Scream Queens (2014), 3 Wicked Witches (2014), 666: Devilish Charm (2014), 666: Kreepy Kerry (2014), 90210 Shark Attack (2014), Bigfoot vs D.B. Cooper (2014), Knock ‘Em Dead (2014), Asian Ghost Story (2016), Bloody Blacksmith (2016), Evil Exhumed (2016), Sorority Slaughterhouse (2016), 666: Teen Warlock (2016), The Wrong Child (2016), The Wrong Roommate (2016), Swamp Freak (2017), The Wrong Crush (2017), The Wrong Man (2017), The Wrong Student (2017), The Wrong Cruise (2018), The Wrong Friend (2018) and The Wrong Teacher (2018). DeCoteau has made films under a variety of pseudonyms, including Ellen Cabot, Richard Chasen, Julian Breen and Victoria Sloan.


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