Review of From Dusk Till Dawn 3: The Hangman's Daughter (2000) by Jason D — 08 Jun 2010

The powers that be had always claimed that the From Dusk Till Dawn series would always be a trilogy, with the final film being a prequel on the origins of the original's Santanica Pandemoneum (originally played by Salma Hayek).

Set in Mexico in the early 1900's, an eclectic group comes together by fate, including famed author Ambrose Bierce (played by Michael Parks, who was Sheriff Earl McGraw in the original), two Bible peddlers (Rebecca Gayheart and Lennie Loftin), outlaw Johnny Madrid (Marco Leonardi) and his gang, his love Esmeralda (Ara Celi), and fellow outlaw Jordana Spiro (from TV's My Boys, who looks totally different in this).

The group rides from and to various things, including Hangman Temuera Morrison (whom some may best remember as Janga Fett, Boba's father in those awful Star Wars prequels), but they all wind up battling even greater demons in a middle of nowhere bar where the employees are all bloodthirsty vampires.

There's a lot of leading up to the Satanica Pandemoneum subplot, which finally comes and goes all too briefly in the film's climax. Otherwise, this third outing tries to follow the original's similar flow and tone, with better results than the inferior Part 2, but for some reason, The Hangman's Daughter is still lacking.

Don't get me wrong, this is a HUGE improvement over part 2, especially with some great acting by Parks and Leonardi, though I kinda wish the film had taken itself a bit more seriously. There were times it would go the slapstick route and become painfully dated and awkward to watch, but thankfully those were few and far between.

Not a bad prequel, especially given it's low-budget, direct-to-DVD roots. Compared to some of the direct-to-DVD stuff of today, this is pure gold. Overall, not bad, but it's time to lay this franchise to rest.

Director P.J. Pesce could have gone on and made a better name for himself, but he decided to be that go-to guy for inferior, piss-poor cash-in sequels to better films (Lost Boys 2: The Tribe, Smokin' Aces 2).