Director
Brian Trenchard-Smith
Cast
Warwick Davis - LubdanJohn Gatins - Scott
Lee Armstrong - Tammy
Caroline Williams - Loretta
John DeMita - Fazio
Michael Callan - Mitch
Tom Dugan - Art
Marcelo Tubert - Gupta
If "Leprechaun" parts one and two are the goofy but fun siblings in the series, part three is the embarrassing sibling that the other movies should keep locked up in the attic and never speak about to the outside world.
Up to now, "Leprechaun 3" is the absolute worst of the "Leprechaun" movies.
I could just stop all this now and spare my braincells from the pending doom that awaits them. But I got this far. The damage has been done already.
As this movie is also known as "Leprechaun: In Vegas," (spoiler) this movie takes place in Las Vegas.
The story begins as a down-on-his luck guy, who's been clearly beat up, stumbles into a pawn shop. He tries to sell the proprietor, Gupta (Marcelo Tubert), a hideous leprechaun statue with a strange amulet around its neck.
Gupta gives the stranger some cash for the statue, and then removes the amulet even though the stranger warned him not to.
As soon as he takes it off, a pot of gold suddenly appears. Drooling over this mysterious mound of gold, Gupta doesn't notice the statue come to life. Obviously, it's Lubdan from the previous movies played again by Warwick Davis.
He attacks Gupta until he sees the amulet. The sight of it frightens Lubdan.
He flees to the back of the pawn shop with his gold, unaware that he dropped one of his gold coins while fleeing from Gupta and the amulet. Gupta finds the coin before looking up info about leprechauns on the computer.
While all this is going on, college kid Scott McCoy (John Gatins) is passing through Vegas. He sees a gorgeous girl named Tammy (Lee Armstrong) stranded on the side of the road.
Her car won't start, and she needs to get to the Lucky Shamrock Casino where she works as an assistant to a magician named Fazio (John DeMita).
Scott offers to drive her to work and tries to persuade Tammy to sneak him into the casino as he's not old enough to gamble. She's hesitant at first but agrees to get him inside.
Once in and past the watchful eyes of the casino, he immediately starts gambling. And, to no one's surprises, he quickly loses all his college tuition money. Welcome to Vegas, kid.
With no money left to squander, the Roulette dealer suggests that he sell his watch at the pawn shop across the street.
That's what he does. It happens to be Gupta's pawn shop.
He wanders in and finds Gupta's body along with the gold coin.
A video about leprechauns is playing on the computer. He picks the gold coin and makes an inadvertent wish that he can win his lost money back, and then some.
The coin instantaneously transports Scott back to the Roulette table where he has a huge winning streak.
Little does he realize that he was almost attacked by the Leprechaun back at the pawn shop moments before being transported. So, Lubdan knows Scott has his gold coin.
Casino manager, Mitch (Michael Callan) wants to put an end to Scott's big winning streak lest it leads to an even bigger financial loss for the casino. He closes the Roulette table and offers Scott a free room.
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| Warwick Davis as Lubdan in "Leprechaun 3." |
Scott runs into Tammy on the casino floor, and brags about his winnings and free room.
Tammy knows how things operate at this crooked casino and encourages him to take his money and leave. He refuses, so she tells him to hide in his room until her shift ends.
And that's what he does.
While Scott takes a shower, Fazio, aware of Scott's lucky streak, breaks into his hotel room to find and snatch his winnings. However, he only manages to steal the gold coin.
Shortly after he leaves, Lubdan barges into Scott's room to retrieve his gold coin.
He and Scott get into a scuffle, during which Lubdan bites him.
Scott manages to fight him off, tossing the Leprechaun out the window.
The coin is stolen from Fazio and is passed around from person to person who all steal it from each other. Each culprit makes wishes on the coin, which leads to Lubdan enacting revenge on each of them after their wish is granted. It doesn't end well for anybody.
Scott finds he's slowly turning into a leprechaun himself thanks to Lubdan's bite.
Finally, Scott and Tammy are forced to face off against the Leprechaun in order to stop him and turn Scott back to his normal self.
This is the first direct-to-video movie in the series which isn't surprising.
It's bad. It's really bad. I mean, the others are campy but still entertaining as long as the audience just goes with the premise of a killer leprechaun.
This installment is painful and pointless. No one even tries to make it as mindlessly fun like the previous two. None of the characters are interesting. They're not even interesting accidentally.
The acting sounds embarrassingly scripted. All the actors...and I mean all of them... remind me of high school students putting on a play.
One thing we learn about Lubdan, who's listed in the credits as simply "Leprechaun," is that he bleeds green blood.
Also, according to this film, if you get bit by a leprechaun, you'll turn into one. Your face will grow a bit hairier like a leprechaun. You'll develop an Irish brogue, along with an insatiable appetite for potatoes, a sudden knowledge of limericks, and an inordinate love for gold. In the plus column, you won't shrink.
All around, "Leprechaun 3" is nothing above a witless, effortless cash grab. The series should end here, but it doesn't. This time, I was cheering for Lubdan to take down all these boring, substandard, uninteresting characters. Watching him do so is all the movie has to offer. "Leprechaun 3" is the start of putting Lubdan into oddball scenarios like some sort of experiment.
Were part two heads down the road away from being horror, and heads towards being a silly comedy, part three knocking on that door. It's far less a horror movie, and more of a campy comedy.
If titles indicate anything, it looks as though nothing will improve in the next installment, "Leprechaun 4: In Space." It's directed by, Brian Trenchard-Smith, who directed this flick. So, we'll see. Maybe I'll get lucky.
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