Live by the Sword, Die by the Stupidity

The late 1990s and early 2000s was an interesting time for the home video market. Because of the way DVD rentals and sales were negotiated (in part because Blockbuster thought they had all the power, when they didn’t, and they ended up arguing themselves out of a big, early share of control of the DVD market), home video sales flourished once DVD hit the market. It was cheap, easier to use than VHS, and arguably better looking. You could buy a movie soon after it came out for rent (instead of months and months later), and the discs took up less space than similar VHS tapes. DVD was the technology so many were looking for, and it boomed among home video enthusiasts.

This boom became a key revenue stream for Hollywood studios. A film didn’t necessarily have to make all its money back in theaters since it could be expected to then make almost the same amount in home sales as it did in theater ticket sales. Films could find long life at retail, and studios could rake in that cash, over and over, for years. And it wasn’t just first-run, blockbusters that saw this effect. Smaller films, especially direct-to-video sequels, also flourished. Money came in hand over fist, and all you really needed to make money was a recognizable license and box art just interesting enough to draw in viewers.

That’s essentially the reason why Wishmaster, the terrible 1997 horror film about an evil djinn, managed to see three sequels despite the fact that the first film didn’t set the world on fire. It wasn’t a flop, but it wasn’t a rousing success like other slashers of the era, but with an interesting premise, and distinct cover art, it and its sequels could lure viewers in, time and again, for the subpar storytelling and terrible special effects. Credit where it was due, at least the kills were creative enough, and the lead performance from Andrew Divoff as the evil djinn was decidedly fun in a scenery chewing kind of way. Sadly, by this third film in the series, none of that applies. Divoff didn’t return after Wishmaster 2: Evil Never Dies, and this third film’s budget is so small and pathetic that not even the kills could be creatively interesting. It’s a bad movie made to leech off a recognizable name, making it no wonder that audiences soon began to cotton to just how bad this series had become.

Diana Collins (A. J. Cook) is a university student studying ancient history and mythology. She works as a T.A. for Professor Joel Barash (Jason Connery), the head of the Anthropology department and lead curator for the university museum. Most evenings Diana has to help the professor at the museum, cataloging finds and doing research, much to the consternation of her boyfriend, Greg Jansen (Tobias Mehler), who thinks the professor might just have a thing for the young co-ed (which, in fact, is true).

While working in the museum one night, Diana finds a strange package addressed to the professor. She opens it, finding an ancient box. Studying the box, she discovers a way to open it, revealing the red gem of the djinn (John Novak) within. She cleans it, unknowingly unleashing the djinn, before passing the gem off to the professor. Soon after the djinn materializes, killing the professor and stealing his identity. Now the djinn/professor has to find Diana, wherever she may be, and get her to make her three wishes so he can unleash hell on Earth. You know, as a djinn is want to do.

There are some serious issues with Wishmaster 3: Beyond the Gates of Hell (aka, Wishmaster 3: Devil Stone, and Wishmaster 3: Sword of Justice) that really hold this film back. And we’re not even talking about holding the film back from justice; these flaws make it so the film isn’t even passably watchable. It’s just a truly shitty film that can’t even scrape by at being decent even by the very low standards of a Wishmaster movie, and that bar was already basically on the floor to begin with. It’s bad. Truly, abysmally bad.

To start, the budget on this film is basically non-existent. The film was clearly produced, guerilla style, around a college campus, using whatever rooms they were allowed and told to film when the college wasn’t busy. Everything feels cheaply thrown together and very staged, with little in consideration thrown towards making the film feel real or lived in. It has the production values of a Nickelodeon television series from the era, trying to get by on its can-do attitude to make up for bad acting, bad sets, bad costumes, and bad everything else.

Hurting matters is the fact that no one in the film can act. You expect that from C-list repertory players willing to be in a direct-to-video sequel, but the real loss here is that Andrew Divoff wasn’t willing to return for this third film (probably because the production team over at Artisan Entertainment wasn’t willing to pay him enough). His replacement, John Novak, lacks all the charisma and charm. Worse, the production team clearly couldn’t even pay for the makeup to showcase the djinn regularly, and they didn’t want to pay John Novak too much, so they let the djinn stay in the form of the professor, as played by Jason Connery, for much of the film. It sucks all the fun out of the lead villain, and thus out of the film as well.

On top of that, the kills are terrible. Say what you will about the first couple of Wishmaster films, but for all the things they got wrong (which was so much) there was at least some effort put into making the kills interesting. The djinn would show up, some idiot would say something dumb in the form of a request or wish, and then the djinn would add an ironic twist to their wish, killing them in the process. That doesn’t happen here though. There’s no humor, no ironic nature to the wish. People will say something, asking for their heart’s desire, and then the djinn grants it. After, for unrelated reasons, the person dies, and not even in a creative way.

As one example, the professor wishes to have two beautiful ladies, the two he finds most gorgeous in all the world, to be there with him, madly in love with him. They appear, get naked, start making out, and then they slice him apart with their nails because… reasons? The kill doesn’t reflect the wish so it doesn’t make any kind of ironic sense, ruining the whole premise of the series up to this point. Similarly, one of Diana’s friends is pinned down by the djinn in the science department, and she wishes to hide somewhere no one will find her. In turn, the djinn shoves her head into a cage of rats and they chew her to death. Kill doesn’t follow wish, and it just doesn’t work.

Of course, it also illustrates the fact that this whole premise can only be stretched so far. You need a writer creative enough to make the wishes interesting (which this film didn’t have), but you also have to have a way to get the djinn out, moving around, and doing his thing without it feeling repetitive. The djinn just wants a host that will make three wishes and release hell on Earth. That was his goal in the first film, and it’s been his goal in every movie since. While I get that’s the character’s motivating factor, it would have been interesting, this deep into the run, if they tried to do something else with the djinn. Instead of repeating the same motions again and again – person finds gem, person unleashes djinn, djinn then stalks the person, killing everyone around them until they make their wishes – it would have been interesting to have a story that changed up the formula.

For instance, since Diana here is a student of history and myth, what if when she found the box and the gem within she tried to control the djinn? Maybe she read some passages on djinn mythology that told her how to bring the djinn under her sway and she was using his power to better her life. While she’s excelling, the djinn is plotting and scheming, trying to find a way to break her hold so he can then unleash hell (since she’s made way more than three wishes at that point). We can still use his backstory, but change up how everything plays out around it. That’s certainly more interesting than this bland retread.

Wishmaster 3: Beyond the Gates of Hell doesn’t have anything new to say about the concept, the character, or the world of this series. It’s direct-to-video fodder released to grab money and keep the brand alive, and it didn’t do either of those things very well. Sadly, even after this spectacular failure, we still have one more of these to get through…