Basket Case 3: The Progeny (1991)

 

 

I couldn’t resist.  Once I watched part 2 and saw that Basket Case 3 was indeed available, I knew I had to watch it, and soon.  Basket Case 3: The Progeny picks up right where part two ended.  Duane Bradley who has been played by Kevin Van Hentenryck in all three films has sewn his deformed brother Belial back onto himself.  Once again Duane has found himself inside a padded cell.  Instead of an asylum, this time it’s at Granny Ruth’s home for “unique” people.  We saw at the end of the second film that Belial has a girlfriend named Eve.  Eve is now pregnant and her delivery date is getting very close.  Granny and the rest of the residents don’t think they will be able to deal with the delivery of Eve’s baby as it’s sure to be a difficult one.  Granny, once again played by Annie Ross, packs up and herds everyone, including Duane, onto a school bus in order to go on a road trip.  Granny is taking the group to her ex-husbands home Dr. Hal Rockwell. 

 

As the time for Eve’s delivery arrives, Hal is not able to help with the delivery.  Enter The Progeny as the title alludes to.  The Progeny just happens to be Granny’s son Little Hal who is a multi-armed blog type creature who looks normal from the neck up.  Trouble multiplies when Duane escapes and ends up in the town jail.  The local sheriff recognizes Duane and wants to get the reward that is offered for Duane and Belials arrest.  Eve gives birth to a litter of 12 babies, all looking very similar to Belial.  Dan Biggers (Elizabethtown and Paris Trout) plays Doc Hal and Jim Grimshaw (When We Were Soldiers and Days of Thunder) is Baxter, one of the deputies that arrests Duane.  While using the same theme as the second film this one is slightly less entertaining.  The cast of characters is just as good, maybe better here and the bus ride scenes have to be some of the more entertaining scenes in the entire trilogy. 

 

 Duane is way more annoying here than he was in the prior 2 films which doesn’t help.  Also working against it is the producers asked for a script rewrite to take out some of the gore.  That’s never good.  Afterwards, director Frank Henenlotter, who besides the Basket Case films, also directed Frankenhooker and Brain Damage decided to take a break from making films as all studios wanted was more Basket Case sequels. After putting all those points inside of a big wicker basket and shaking it up I’m going to grade this one close to what I graded the original film.  So I will give this three episodes of Renaldo out of five.  If ridiculous, over the top low budget grind-house films is your cup of tea, I wholeheartedly recommend the Basket Case trilogy.  With each film above average for me, I find the films as a set a success.