Child's Play 3 (1991)

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General		Extras
Category	Horror	Theatrical Trailer
Rating
Year Of Production	1991
Running Time	85:53
RSDL / Flipper	No/No	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Language Select Then Menu
Region Coding	2,4	Directed By	Jack Bender
Studio Distributor	Universal Pictures Home Video	Starring	Justin Whalin Perrey Reeves Jeremy Sylvers
Case	?
RPI	$29.95	Music	John D'Andrea Cory Lerios

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	1.85:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	1.85:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	English for the Hearing Impaired Dutch Swedish Danish Norwegian Finnish	Smoking	Yes
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    "Presto! You're bored!"

    In late 1990, after the intake from Child's Play 2 showed significantly less return compared to Child's Play, the executives at Universal Pictures must have sat down and had a serious think about their strategy for Child's Play 3. From what I could tell in 1993, when I got to see the resultant film, they came to the very interesting conclusion that Andy Barclay as a child was no longer interesting (go figure), and that he would make a more interesting adolescent. They also decided that the ancillary characters from the previous two films were no longer of any interest, and that they should be replaced with the kind that audiences would pay money to see getting killed.

    All of which is of course bogged down by the tremendously silly nature of a teen slasher based around the idea of a three-foot doll, possessed by an American serial killer who practises voodoo, killing fully grown individuals. The film fast-forwards eight years from the closing of the previous film, with the action picking up in the boardroom of the toy company that manufactures Good Guy dolls. In spite of having been shot through the heart in the first film, then having molten plastic poured over him before having his head blown off with compressed air in the second, Chucky (voice by Brad Dourif) is revived. Upon killing the CEO of the corporation, Chucky uses his computer to discover the location of Andy Barclay (Justin Whalin) in a sequence that gives us an interesting spelling of the word "juvenile" ("juvinile") at 10:41.

    Andy Barclay is now "remanded" to a lovely place called the Kent Military School, which is a rather interesting example of the victim being treated like a criminal once again. Anyway, upon his arrival in this wonderful place, Andy meets up with such lovely characters as Lieutenant Colonel Shelton (Travis Fine), Colonel Cochrane (Dakin Matthews), and Sergeant Botnick (Andrew Robinson). None of these characters draw any sympathy, and indeed, the whole reason to watch this film is to laugh and cheer at the exceptionally dramatic, grisly deaths that Chucky dishes out to them. The people that pass for good guys in this film are Tyler (Jeremy Sylvers), who has to be the stupidest child I've yet seen in a horror film; De Silva (Perrey Reeves), who makes a great love interest for the teenage Andy; and Whitehearst (Dean Jacobson), who is basically dead weight (literally in one sequence).

    As I mentioned, the redeeming factor of this film is that it is unrelentingly cruel to the people who do get killed, which is just as well because there is precious little about the rest of the film that bears watching. Chucky's jokes are just grating, the characters themselves make one think of all the violence (or other things) one would perpetrate upon them in the real world, and the entertaining moments are just too few and far between. In spite of those things, this film is a massive improvement upon Child's Play 2, and somewhat more interesting than the original. Just don't expect anything too thrilling from it, and you should be fine.

Video

    The transfer is presented in an aspect ratio of 1.85:1, and it is 16x9 Enhanced. One thing in this film's favour is that it tends to use this ratio in a fairly dynamic manner, with plenty of things to keep attention focused on the entire shot rather than merely the central action.

    The transfer starts out on a slightly awry note after the credits sequence, with the boardroom meeting that basically accounts for the entirety of Chapter 2 being somewhat hazy and smeared-looking. This improves once the ball gets rolling, however, and the rest of the film is sharp enough that you soon forget about this momentary lapse. The shadow detail is rather good, which is just as well considering that a significant portion of this film takes place in the dark, although it is not up to the standards of more recent films. There is no low-level noise.

    The colours of this film, much like the previous two Child's Play instalments, are muted and drab, reflecting locations that simply don't offer that much in the way of bright colour. The majority of this film takes place in a military school that is located in a cold, snowy place, although the finale in the amusement park just throws everything off balance. The transfer captures all the colours in the original film without any hiccups.

    MPEG artefacts were not noticed in this transfer, although the aforementioned boardroom sequence appeared to be on the verge of pixelization during a couple of shots. Film-to-video artefacts were also quite minimal, with precious little shimmering visible in this transfer, and the shimmering that did appear was gone faster than I could notice it. Film artefacts were the biggest problem in this transfer, however, with numerous small nicks on the picture making an appearance, as well as some rather sizeable marks that looked like dirt on the interpositive. The most conspicuous film artefact came at 61:03, when a rather sizeable white scratch appeared over Chucky's face for half a second. Again, considering the age of this film, this is a remarkably clean transfer.

    The English for the Hearing Impaired subtitles present on this disc contain slightly more aural cues than was the case on Child's Play 2, making them a little more useful. They are still not exactly what I would call particularly useful, however.

Video Ratings Summary

Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

    As was the case with Child's Play 2, we receive our soundtrack only in unspectacular Dolby Digital 2.0 with a bitrate of 192 kilobits per second. This time, we do not even get the benefit of a dub, or a commentary track, with the only soundtrack on offer being the original English dialogue.

    The dialogue in this film is generally quite clear and easy to make out, although the fine details of exactly what words are being said, such as when the two teams march off for the war games, are generally lost. Suffice it to say that the important details, what precious few there are in this film, are easy to follow. There were no discernable problems with audio sync that could be blamed upon the transfer, although Brad Dourif's voice did sound a little out of sync when the Chucky puppet's face is torn off.

    The score music in this film is credited to John D'Andrea and Cory Lerios, two names I have not heard before or since. The opening theme in this film does promise quite a lot with its dramatic refrains, but that's about all that can be said for this score. I never heard anything memorable in a musical sense after this part of the film, which doesn't exactly spell a ringing endorsement.

    The surround channels are not used by this soundtrack at all, which is a real pity considering the opportunities for passing bullets or reverberation to be divided into them. Despite this, the soundtrack appeared to have enough channel separation for the sound effects and the dialogue to happily co-exist, which is about all one can ask from stereo.

    The subwoofer was not specifically used by this soundtrack, either, although it did get some small amounts of redirected signal at times, all of which sounded pretty weak. This is a pity considering the number of opportunities there are for some heavy LFE effects throughout this feature, but I guess complaining will do me no good.

Audio Ratings Summary

Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

Menu

    The menu is static, 16x9 Enhanced, and easy to navigate.

Theatrical Trailer

    Clocking in at ninety-two seconds, this trailer is presented in an aspect ratio of 1.33:1 with Dolby Digital 2.0 sound, and it is not 16x9 Enhanced.

    There is censorship information available for this title. Click here to read it (a new window will open). WARNING: Often these entries contain MAJOR plot spoilers.

    From what I can gather, this disc is not currently available in Region 1. The next sequel, Bride Of Chucky, is.

    Child's Play 3, while being an improvement on its immediate predecessor, is still a very B-grade attempt at horror, unable to get over the inherently silly nature of its central premise.

    The video transfer is very good.

    The audio transfer is unremarkable.

    The extras are minimal.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall