recommended

All that we are seeing on the screen is happening with real people, real action sequences in the background, forcing the eye to watch as if we were there.

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

Beyond re-animator is the final installment of Stuart Gordon's "Re-animator" series that began in 1985 and like most late installments, comes off as unnecessary and a failed attempt to cash in on a popular title. In the fashion of "Jason goes to Hell", "Freddy's dead: The Final Nightmare" and "Halloween: H20", Beyond Re-animator attempts to restart the series by trying to retcon certain plot elements while pretending to be a legitimate sequel. The result, as usual was a colossal mess of inconsistencies, leaving only the most superficial elements from the original two films without the heart of what made those films so beloved in the first place. We find our protagonist Herbert West imprisoned in a federal jail after his former assistant Dan Kain apparently turned him in to the authorities for his illegal experimentation. We never find out why Dan, a prominent character in the original films would do such a thing and Beyond Re-animator brushes off any details as unimportant. We're also provided with no explanation as to how West escaped the cliffhanger conflict at the end of the last film "Bride of Re-animator". Jeffrey Combs reprises his role as the mad scientist, who continues his devilish experiments on whatever subjects he can gain access to within the confines of his small prison cell. However, everything changes for West when Dr. Howard Philips (Jason Barry) takes over as the prison physician. Philips had witnessed the power of West's reagent serum as a child and has since become obsessed with the science of re-animating the dead. Handing West his iconic syringe containing the glowing green reagent, it's only a matter of time before West restarts his old experiments, and the entire prison is thrown into chaos. The film plays out in the typical fashion that we've come to expect from this series. Characters die only to be used as test subjects for West and Philips who bring them back to life as vicious, murderous monsters. The style blends graphic body horror with ridiculous slap stick comedy. While entertaining at times, Beyond Re-animator does little more than copy it's predecessors and fails to further the story of Herbert West in any meaningful way. The absence of Stuart Gordon is obvious as the film feels more like a what if scenario, rather than a genuine attempt to further an existing mythos. The story is convoluted as the majority of scenes serve little more than excuses to get from A to point B. For example, there's an ongoing joke about one of the inmates having a pet rat. We see West experiment on the rat which serves as an all to predictable foreshadowing of the rat being re-animated as one of West's experiments and eventually attacking his former owner. The characters in this film, save for Herbert West, were all one dimensional and failed to establish meaningful identities for themselves. Herbert West is deranged and lacking in social graces as always, making him the sole source of entertainment. By comparison, the scenes without West were uninteresting and took up far to much of the film's run time. It was fun seeing Jeffrey Combs reprise his most famous role one last time. However, the unoriginal plot and hollow performances by the rest of the cast simply couldn't keep up with him and ultimately dragged him down along with them and the rest of this film. Beyond Re-animator attempted to bring new life to the Re-animator series. Unfortunately, this experiment was a failure.

This is a movie that works out much better than the second one did. All I can say is that Brian Yuzna had definitely grown- and gained more experience as a director, since he doesn't make the same mistakes he still did make with the second movie out of the series, which he also had directed.It's still far from a great movie but it's just still such a big relief that it isn't half as bad as its disappointing predecessor. the most pleasant thing about this movie is that it thankfully features some good comedy again. It's a fun movie to watch. And also nothing more than that really but that's really enough to still consider this a watchable enough movie.The first sequel "Bride of Re-Animator" felt the need to be just like the first movie, which meant that it basically was a less impressive rehash of the first movie really. It also made the mistake by featuring most characters out of the first movie again, while this third movie is far more original with its story and also has lots of new characters in it. Dr. Herbert West is the only returning character and also was the only one needed really. It actually also makes this movie work out way better as a sequel and it made me wish that the second movie never got made at all and this is the only true sequel to the cult-classic "Re-Animator", from 1985.It's still a movie that does plenty wrong though. Even though the story is more original this time, it isn't exactly being a solid one either. Especially the second half of the movie feels quite messy and the movie starts to loose the focus on its main characters. If the movie would had been more like its first half, it would had been a much better movie entirely.But I at least never got really bored with it and I also never hated anything about it. The movie managed to find the right balance between all of its comedy and B-movie ingredients, which made this movie work out as a genuinely fun one to watch.It was also a well looking movie, that besides featured some good effects and gore in it. All despite its very low budget. Especially when you start putting all those things in perspective, this is simply a good movie to watch, within its genre.Finally, after 18 years, a worthy and fun enough sequel to "Re-Animator"!6/10 http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/

As a child, Howard Philips witnesses the death of his sister at the hands of a reanimated corpse, the grisly result of one of mad genius Herbert West's crazy experiments. Thirteen years later, Howard (Jason Barry), now a brilliant young doctor, takes up residency at the Arkham Penitentiary where West (Jeffrey Combs) is incarcerated, in the hope that he can convince the scientist to reveal the secret behind his reagent and use it to help mankind.West, who has been carrying out experiments inside his prison cell using makeshift equipment, is only too happy to help: with proper lab facilities at his disposal, he can continue work on his new discovery—nano-plasm, the energy present in all living creatures—which he believes will stabilise his otherwise violent test subjects. West's ideas are clearly a little flaky (in order for him to harvest the nano-plasm needed to restore a life, someone has to die), but then so is he, and once again, his experiments only lead to chaos and carnage ('You were wrong!' screams an angry Howard at West as he realises the true horror of their actions; 'It was a THEORY' replies the scientist dryly).Beyond Re-animator is the first of the series to be produced under Brian Yuzna's Spanish production label Fantastic Factory, and as such, it suffers from a slightly less polished look and feel to its predecessors (as well as a supporting cast who all bear slight traces of a Spanish accent). Thankfully, Yuzna's sense of humour is just as dark and demented as before and the result is another hugely enjoyable exercise in outrageous splatter, deviancy, and total lunacy.Admittedly, after the excellent opening scene, the film takes a while to get up to speed again, but once Yuzna and his talented team of effects experts hit their stride, there's simply no stopping the madness: there's a nasty warden who, after being killed and injected with rat nano-plasm, becomes a half rodent/half human zombie who wants to use West's glowing green formula to prolong the agony of execution for those on death row; a drug addict explodes after overdosing on reagent; a prisoner's upper torso wanders around on its hands during the films crazy closing riot scene; the prison's sexy nurse (Bárbara Elorrieta) has her dress torn off by a zombie that proceeds to savage her naked breast; Howard's hot reporter girlfriend Laura (the incredibly gorgeous Elsa Pataky) is transformed into a schizophrenic zombie dominatrix clad in a tight corset, black stockings, suspenders, and stiletto heels; and a rat makes off with the warden's severed penis.Oh, and be sure to continue watching during the end credits for what is possibly the film's funniest gag (depending on how warped your sense of humour is, of course).

Highly entertaining addition to the Reanimator series. Let's be honest here, by this point you've figured out whether you like Reanimator movies or not, and this one will in no way change your mind one way or the other. It's pretty gory throughout, though it loses its way a bit towards the end with too much running around the prison it's set in, and not a lot actually happening. The nipple biting scene is great, and will have most squirming. Also, there's a very amusing kinky nurse and an impossibly angry lead man. All round good fun.' Screaming Mad George' effects too, so you know you are in for a visual treat.