Too much of everything

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

On a road-trip with her family, a teen and her brother encounter a strange creature that manages to follow them to their apartment- complex in the city and begin eating the residents forcing a former fighter to help stop the creatures.This one was quite the fun and highly enjoyable entries in the series. There's not much really wrong here with this one and most of that really stems from the fact that there's just a way too long beginning that holds off the creature's appearance until much later than expected here. The trip through the countryside and meeting up with the different residents of the complex aren't all that impressive or exciting efforts throughout here watching this, and it really does get this off to a somewhat sluggish beginning. Coupled with the again heavy cheesiness on display, these here are the film's few problems that do crop up here that makes for a few small problems but not nearly enough here to hold off the far more impressive and enjoyable amount of fun featured along the way here. Again, the film's inherent cheesiness and absolutely goofy creatures at the forefront of the film are a major part of the film's enjoyment as this one manages to get a lot of mileage out of them. The very nature of featuring them in the same exact set-up as before, with their hairy-reptilian appearance and miniature stature that practically devours everything in their path allows for some silly comedy to come from them breaking into the apartment and watching a cooking show on the television set or eating through the entire apartment simply because they're left alone inside, being able to contemplate strategy sessions and a plan of attack which manage to get some nice laughs with their cheesy natures all work together into making for some cheesy good times. The fact that there's some thrilling suspense moments as well gives this some even bigger pluses which manages to give this the same sort of feeling that occurred in the original where it gives this it's biggest plus, from the encounter in the laundry-room basement, the family's first encounter on the hallway leading to their battle to barricade the apartment from the creatures and the different encounters up in the attic where they finally manage to get away from the creatures gives this plenty of thrilling action scenes all built on the idea of the fun, goofy creatures still being perceived as a threat with their voracious appetite leading to the fun here. Along with the great manner of bringing them to life here, these here manage to make this one a fun and enjoyable addition to the franchise.Rated PG-13: Violence and Language.

Shot back-to-back with Critters 4, this third instalment of the relatively successful comedy-horror series featuring the oddly cute but deadly crites was the first to skip theatres and arrive straight to video. The movie starts as widowed father Clifford (John Calvin), his daughter Annie (Aimee Brooks) and son Johnny (Christian and Joseph Cousins) drive home from their family vacation. When they are forced to pull over due to a flat tire, Annie and Johnny head to a rest stop to play a bit of Frisbee, where they encounter Josh (Leonardo DiCaprio), a floppy-haired cool-kid with an arsehole of a stepfather (William Dennis Hunter), who just so happens to be the landlord of the family. While stationed there, they encounter alien bounty hunter Charlie (Don Keith Opper) who warns the children of another crite invasion.After a summary of the previous two movies by the former Grover's Bend sheriff-turned-intergalactic alien killer, the family arrive at their apartment building where a collection of comedy archetypes reside. Some eggs hatch and the usual havoc ensues as the new collection of furry killers travel from floor to floor munching anything they can get their teeth into. The action stops at the apartment building once we arrive there and this is where the budget constraints become obvious. Not that the Critters franchise was ever blessed with innovative special effects or puppet-work, but things seem especially lazy and poorly done here.With everything taking place in one location, we are forced to sit through set-piece after set-piece, as the crites do little but bounce or roll to the next attack and use their poisoned darts to varying degrees of success, usually depending on who they're shooting at. The attempts are humour are childish, with one of the few interesting characters - no-nonsense maintenance lady Marcia (Katherine Cortez) - left literally swinging from a wire for an extended amount of time in a running joke that quickly wears thin. Similar to Gremlins (1984), there is an attempt to give the critters some kind of personality, but they prove as indistinguishable from one another as they have previously. Worth watching only for the curiosity of seeing future A-lister Leonardo DiCaprio in one of his earliest appearances.

On their way home from a vacation, railway worker Clifford & his two children Annie & Johnny pull up into a rest stop with a flat tyre. While Clifford fixes the tyre, Annie & Johnny encounter Charlie McFadden, who warns them about the Crites. They dismiss him as crazy but a group of Crites hitch a ride on the underside of the RV. Once the family return to their home – an apartment complex that is due to be demolished to make way for a mini-mall by the landlord (who secretly plans to force the tenants to vacate without having to pay them relocation costs) – the Crites begin terrorising the building.Critters was an enterprising knockoff of Gremlins that somehow made a name for itself in video afterlife. It spawned three sequels – the turgid Critters 2, this one & a further sequel with Critters 4. These days, the Critters sequels, particularly this one, have been regarded as a bad joke by the actors in it, especially Leonardo DiCaprio, who made his debut here as an adolescent.Despite the negative publicity, Critters 3 is actually not too bad – in fact it is the closest the sequels get to matching the light family friendly fun of the original. The Critters are kept to the shadows for the majority of the film but once the lights go off, the real fun begins. Scribe David J. Schow, who would soon get famous with his script for The Crow about three years after this, gets a lot of mileage out of the Critters' attacks – and their appearances. It is a far cry from the usual output of Schow's bread & butter splatterpunk stories but it is still a fun ride. He & director Kristine Peterson do their best to cater to genre fans without letting the adults feel cheated by having the Critters do their usual thing & having Don Opper's bounty hunter return to blast the Critters yet again. Fellow hunter Terrence Mann also returns but only in the end-credits sequence that follows the film. If there is anything wrong with the film, it would be that the film is far too soft for the bodycount to happen, but the dogleg twists provide some suspense for the audience.

Critters 3 continues the story of the hairy Critters from outer space that try to kill any humans in sight. This time Leonardo DiCaprio joins tenants in an LA apartment complex as they fight to escape death. The film starts off with a family road trip. They stop off at Grover's Bend (same place from the first two movies) and some Critters and their eggs attach onto the car. They eventually wind up in downtown Los Angeles where they live in this seedy apartment building. Of course the eggs hatch and are now on the loose. They kill off a maintenance worker in the basement before attacking a large woman's Bunny slippers. Once they hear her screams for help, the chase is on between the tenants and the little monsters. Leo DiCaprio plays a kid with a nasty stepfather who is actually the landlord of the apartment.There are plenty of laughs throughout the whole thing. The large woman getting stung in her behind with the critters spikes. There is a funny scene reminiscent to Critters 2 in the diner when the monsters start eating the food and make a mess of the place. In Critters 3, we discover that the critters can indeed pass gas. This third Critters is very different from the other two, but yet just as good. I thought the location of the apartment building was smart and I like the chase scenes throughout the place.Definitely a good addition to the comical horror series. Check this one out for sure.7/10