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STUDIO: Dimension Home Video
MSRP: $14.99
RATED: R
RUNNING TIME: 78 Minutes
SPECIAL FEATURES:
• Behind the scenes featurette
• Cast auditions
• Commentary by the director
• Theatrical trailers
The Pitch
A movie about killer bugs that adapt to any situation produced by a movie studio that refuses to adapt to a marketplace that’s totally indifferent to this franchise.
The Humans
Lance Henriksen, Alexis Dziena, Karl Geary and Rebecca Mader
The Nutshell
Remember those Judas Breed bugs from Mimic? The ones that were created to destroy a disease carrying population of cockroaches in New York City? Remember how in addition to adapting to become the perfect cockroach predators, they also adapted to become the perfect predator of human beings? Remember how they were supposedly killed in the original film? Remember how they were supposedly killed in Mimic 2? Stop lying, you never watched Mimic 2.
Surprise, surprise, the Judas Breed bugs are back. How did they return? No one knows. They just materialized back in New York City, right outside the window of one of the few survivors of the cockroach plague. In a self admitted imitation of Rear Window, the sickly survivor spies on his neighbors through the use of a camera and ends up catching sight of the vicious Judas Breed bugs tearing people apart. Will he be able to convince the authorities to believe him? Will Lance Henriksen sleepwalk his way through yet another cash-in film? Will anyone give a damn that this film exists? Make an educated guess.
"I’m freaking serious. Get me out of this movie right now or someone’s gonna get hurt."
The Lowdown
With most horror franchises that have been whored out on home video well past their freshness date, you can at least look back at the original film and see the innovative ideas or themes that made it so popular in the first place and allowed for the myriad of sequels to be made. The Hellraiser franchise may be stretched the point of total retardation at this point, but the first two films had such cool visuals and ideas that you can understand why people would continue to watch the sequels, hoping in vain to see some remnants of those elements.
This is not the case with Mimic. Mimic was nothing more than a cheesy monster film better known for the fact that Miramax hacked it up than anything else. Sure, it was an entertaining monster movie, but was there anything there that demanded a sequel, let alone two? It’s the same lack of forethought and greed that gave us a sequel to Pumpkinhead.
Already establishing how unnecessary and flat out stupid a third Mimic film is, the biggest compliment that can be fostered upon it is that at least the studio wasn’t so cruel as to waste a large amount of your time with it. Should you choose to subject yourself to Mimic 3, you’ll only lose roughly 80 minutes of your life. Dimension are deserving of a tiny modicum of respect for knowing well enough to cut bait with the film and make the experience as quick and painless as possible, like ripping off a Band-Aid.
That’s what you get for ignoring the G.I. Joe PSAs. Never get inside an empty refrigerator!
The central problem with Mimic 3 is that there simply isn’t a point. The film is over almost as soon as it begins. We have no reason to care about the characters, we have no idea how the creatures reappeared and there’s no resolution. There are references made to an overarching conspiracy and apocalypse scenarios but nothing is followed up on. It’s simply 60 minutes of build-up and 20 minutes of monster scenes, followed by an ending that makes you say, “That’s it?” The film stinks of incredibly heavy editing given the hollow feel of the story and the short run time.
If you absolutely must indulge in some direct to video horror, whether it be serious or cheesy, there are so many more movies out there that will be much more satisfying than Mimic 3. The only people who would be excited to see such a film are diehard Mimic fans who write Internet fan fiction sequels, if such people even exist.
I’m gonna be honest fellas. This is just a stepping stone towards my goal of getting naked in a Bill Murray movie.
The Package
It’s quite shocking that a cheap cash-in film like this one has some special features with it besides trailers and animated menus. The biggest feature is a commentary by the director. This was one of J.T. Petty’s first films, so he’s obviously not going to go into great detail about any problems that went with the filming or any big studio interference. No need to burn your bridges so quickly. His enthusiasm as a young director comes through on the track, but as bad as the film is the likelihood of anyone wanting to listen to a commentary track about it is remote.
The disc also includes a behind the scenes featurette and cast auditions. The latter were filmed with a low grade camcorder and are difficult to hear correctly, but are pretty interesting to check out. It would have been even better if auditions for actors who didn’t get the part were included, if only to see what acting that isn’t good enough for a film like Mimic 3 looks like. The documentary features a cast and crew who are enthusiastic about the creative process, which only makes it all the more tragic that their energy is being wasted on a film like this.