JEEPERS CREEPERS 3

US, 2017, 100 minutes, Colour.

Stan Shaw, Jonathan Breck, Gabriel Haugh, Brandon Smith, Meg Foster, Chester Rushing, Ryan Moore.

Directed by Victor Salva.

Writer-director Victor Salva created the small horror franchise, Jeepers Creepers, making two episodes in the early 2000 is. He then returned 14 years later for this third film. In 2021, other filmmakers took up the ideas for Jeepers Creepers: Reborn.

While the film evokes the atmosphere of the first two films, a monstrous character, ability to fly, to descend on the unwary, who appears to feed from humans to stay alive, the presentation here is fairly standard, smaller budget, especially for special effects.

The film opens with darkness and an attack on the Road, various officials trying to combat the monster, present is the sheriff, Stan Shaw, who remembers the former presence of the monster 23 years earlier. Throughout the film he is in pursuit of the monster, tough and resolute. He is partnered with a concern sheriff, often timid, finally confronting the monster. There are various other characters around the country town who become involved.

There is also a personal story, family memories of the monster, especially the grandmother played by Meg Foster. There is also the younger generation, working in the town, working on the farm, for teenagers riding their bikes and taunting the monster – fatally. It is also an earnest young man in the town who is devoted to one of the family who has a passion for riding a horse.

So, with the human element and the horror elements, there is a combination of pleasantness and alarm – and, perhaps borrowing from Stephen King’s It, a theory that the monster will appear every 23 years and stay for 23 days, replenishing from human victims.