It is a performances centric movie

a film so unique, intoxicating and bizarre that it not only demands another viewing, but is also forgivable as a satirical comedy where the jokes eventually take the back seat.

Excellent characters with emotional depth. My wife, daughter and granddaughter all enjoyed it...and me, too! Very good movie! You won't be disappointed.

This is a gorgeous movie made by a gorgeous spirit.

Carol Anne has been sent to live with her Aunt Patricia Wilson-Gardner (Nancy Allen), her husband Bruce Gardner (Tom Skerritt), and stepdaughter Donna Gardner (Lara Flynn Boyle) in the Chicago highrise which Bruce manages. Her relatives don't know the story of her ghostly encounters. Carol Anne is in group treatment under the care of disbelieving Dr. Seaton when Rev. Henry Kane reappears. Tangina Barrons is alerted to his presence.First, it's her older sister. Now, it's her parents. They may as well make Carol Anne an orphan in the movie. It would make more sense. The whole movie is flat. It is not scary and none of it is interesting. I certainly don't want to make fun of "Carol Anne" out of respect for Heather O'Rourke. She remains a positive for the franchise till the bitter end.

I recently have been going through a "ghost kick." I've been watching tons of ghost and haunted-house films. Everything I can get my hands on- from classics like "The Haunting" and "The Changeling", to foreign films like "Ringu" and "Ju-On", to modern films like the "Paranormal Activity" trilogy and "Insidious." So, naturally, when I saw "Poltergeist II" and "III" on Netflix, I started them up, intending to watch them back-to-back. I actually like "Poltergeist II"- it's silly, but is a fun sequel overall. I hadn't seen the third film, however, in years, and I wish it had stayed this way."Poltergeist III" is scary. Not because of effective jumps, a creepy atmosphere, or top-notch writing like the original. But because it is so bad. Just foul, awful. Tedious.This time around, Carol-Anne (Heather O'Rourke) has been sent to live with her relatives in Chicago, supposedly because she's been accepted into a school for gifted youngsters. The real reason is that the actors for the first two films probably read the script and refused to be involved.She is staying with her aunt Pat (Nancy Allen), her uncle Bruce (Tom Skerrit) and her cousin Donna (Laura Flynn Boyle). Bruce owns the high-rise building where they stay, and Pat apparently works in an art gallery in the same building.Carol-Anne has been tormented by memories from the first two films. At her new school, a doctor named Seaton (Richard Fire) believes that she isn't haunted by ghosts, but rather is a manipulator who can cause mass-hallucinations by using hypnosis... uh... yeah, the movie actually goes there. It insults the audience by suggesting that Carol-Anne may be a manipulative hypnotist. Of course, we know it's actually the vengeful spirit of Henry Kane who is haunting her. But the fact that the movie stoops this low by even suggesting this as a possible explanation is just pitiful.Blah, blah, blah- you know the drill. Kane catches up with Carol-Anne, and torments her, nobody believes her at first, and so on. Eventually, the family must come together (with the help of Tangina, again played by Zelda Rubinstein) to stop Kane once and for all.This movie... sucks.The plot is all over the place. The first two films at least had a logic to them. This movie starts up by adding new rules and layers to the "haunting" that make no sense. Kane just sort of hangs around inside of mirrors the whole time. I'm not kidding. Mirrors were never used like this in the first two films. But in literally EVERY SINGLE SCENE, there's a lame scare where Kane will appear in a mirror (mirrors line the halls of the building), and it actually becomes funny within 10 minutes, because you KNOW it's going to continue. They try to change it up later on, by doing other gags where the mirrors don't reflect things properly, but it's still the EXACT SAME "SCARE"... It happens at least 50 times in the movie, I'm not kidding. It gets old really fast. They sort-of try to explain it (I guess the mirrors reflect the spiritual world, or some such nonsense), but it doesn't mean anything.Also, whereas the first two films used special effects effectively, and had all sorts of monsters and creatures and skeletons, this film has none. Remember the giant skull from the first film? The "Vomit Creature" from the second? They are tossed out the window so Kane can randomly appear in a mirror and cackle before vanishing in every single scene. It's so uncreative that it hurts to watch.I also must say, the "rules" for this film have no consistency. Somehow, Kane can now "clone" people in the Mirror/Spirit world, so half the movie, you're not seeing the characters, but rather evil reflections of them that don't do anything in particular, just act evil at random. Like everything else, it makes no sense.The film is a mess. There is also a recurring "scare" where Carol-Anne will hear Kane calling her, but like the mirror gag, it becomes funny when we realize it never, ever stops. I was able to predict when it was coming and say it along with him in the movie, it was so blatant and over-used.The acting was pretty bad. O'Rourke tries, but can't work with the material, and seems more like a brat than an innocent little girl. Nancy Allan starts off nice, but her dialog makes her come off as a nasty, self-centered jerk even though she's one of our "heroes", and Tom Skerritt... he just seems creepy and unsettling, even though he's meant to be a nice guy. The actors simply have no good dialog or development to feed off of, and all suffer for it.The film is abysmal. I'm only giving it a 2 to honor the late Heather O'Rourke. But it's actually, easily a 1 out of 10. Avoid this, please, for your sake!

Carol Anne has been sent to live with her Aunt and Uncle in an effort to hide her from the clutches of the ghostly Reverend Kane He tracks her down and terrorises her in her relatives' apartment in a tall glass building.Will he finally achieve his target and capture Carol Anne again, or will Tangina be able, yet again, to thwart him?....We all know what the film is most famous for, so i won't really dwell on that, but the studio really cocked this up, being scared of offending viewers by changing what could have been a redeeming ending for an average movie.Plotwise, it's as if Kane thinks the only way he can get back into the light is to seek Carol Anne, and the fact that her name is mentioned over a hundred times, proves that the writers were on autopilot.But this is the epitome of eighties horror, all shoulder pads and style over substance.For the most part, the acting isn't too bad, and the use of mirrors and other such stuff is used to good effect, it's just the gaping plot holes and that awful ending really ruin the film.Where exactly did Scott go? It's a question that will haunt us until the original ending is finally released, and the guys from MGM will get off their behinds and dig it up from the vaults.The effects are good, and there are some quite uneasy moments, but one cannot watch this film for what it is, a horror, without thinking of the fate of it's main star.All in all, an average sequel, which could have been great if the studio had never interfered with the proper ending.RIP Heather

I admit that this might of not been as good as the others, but it had a certain charm to it. It was a whole movie in itself. It really didn't need the back story that much. It does help to know it though. One small complaint I have is from Heather O'Rourke. In the first and second she was this cute little girl and she was tiny. So it actually made her a bit creepier at parts; even when she talked. For some reason since she is more grown up in their film, they made her talk really smart and snotty. Like she knew the whole world. But also since she was older, they could do a lot more with her in the film. The rest of the cast was pretty good. Tom Skerritt and Nancy Allen were great. Lara Flynn was OK at the time. Some of the side characters were bad actors though. Nathan Davis played an amazing Kane. He was really creepy. Now this film was great until the end. The ending was rushed to bring the film out. That is because they couldn't film the original ending since Heather O'Rourke died in real life. That had to use a double that didn't show her face and change the ending. But other than that, it really was a great film for a horror type season.