L'Histoire sans fin 3 : Retour à Fantasia

When this film showed up on the cable listing, I had a sudden urge to see it even though I knew it was probably going to be terrible. The original was such a staple of my childhood, yet had such an incomplete ending, that I was intensely curious to see what they would do with another sequel. Besides, I knew that it could not possibly be worse than "The NeverEnding Story II."

Boy, was I wrong.

"The NeverEnding Story III" has rightly earned its place among IMDb voters as the 79th worst movie of all time. It is so bad that, in writing this review, I risk making it sound like it's worth watching, sort of like "Plan Nine from Outer Space." I assure you, this film is in no way in the Ed Wood category of being so incompetently done that it becomes enjoyable to watch. Those moviegoers who take pleasure in seeing cinematic disasters should be forewarned about this one, lest they never again be able to erase from their memory Rockbiter's gravelly-voiced version of "Born to be Wild," played in a video sequence early in the film and again during the end credits.

No, I am not joking.

The second film does have its admirers, and as much as I hated it, I sort of understand where they're coming from. At least that film had a legitimate purpose, to tell the second half of the novel which the first film had neglected to do. But now the story is finished, so the third film has to make up its own reason for being, with an even shabbier budget than that of the second film. So it concocts a story that allows us to see as little of Fantasia as possible. Here, a series of magical mishaps causes a bunch of creatures from Fantasia to be transported into the real world. These include Falkor the luck dragon, a baby rockbiter about the size of a fountain statue, and a talking tree. (Falkor, who must have gotten a lobotomy sometime between the second and third film, will chase after a "dragon" at a Chinese festival.) What we do see of Fantasia makes the place seem a lot smaller than I had ever imagined. Almost all of the scenes there take place in the empress's chamber in the Ivory Tower, though there is also one sequence where we get to see Rockbiter's home (just what I've always wanted to do!) with Mama Rockbiter and of course the previously mentioned Baby Rockbiter sitting in front of a large stone TV set. Needless to say, the inhabitants of Fantasia seem to possess quite a bit more knowledge of Earth than they did in the first film. When the gnome describes Bastian as "not exactly Arnold Schwarzenegger in the muscle department," we're reminded how much more enjoyable the film would probably be if Schwarzenegger were actually in it.

The cause of these events is that a gang of school bullies steals the book and discovers that it gives them the power to wreak havoc on the inhabitants of Fantasia. Strangely, these modern kids never seem surprised that magic exists. Think how long it took in the first film for even imaginative, ten-year-old Bastian to become convinced of the book's supernatural qualities. These bullies, much older and more concrete, never go through such a skeptical period. And later, when the Auryn falls into the hands of a teenage girl, she treats it with about the same level of awe as if she got hold of her parents' credit card.

There are actually some familiar actors in this mess. Mr. Koreander is played by the British character actor Freddie Jones, Bastian is played by the kid from "Free Willy," and the main bully is played by a relatively young Jack Black, who now probably would like to do with this film what George Lucas wants to do with the "Star Wars Holiday Special."

In the beginning, there was The Neverending Story. It is the best film ever made.

Then, there was The Neverending Story II. I'll vent my spleen over that mess later.

And then, there came this waste of film and effort. Hold on a minute while I go throw up.

While it is a clean, safe film in terms of subject matter, the third NES should never have been made. And I mean NEVER. The first two movies covered all the wondrous things within the original book, so I don't understand why this film was made at all. It is just cheesy, stupid, abysmal, and an absolute disgrace to the idea of The Neverending Story.

First of all, what's going on with this stepsister of Bastian's that has somehow appeared? Wrong, wrong. . . Then, what happened to good old Falkor? And most of all, where is Atreyu? If you are bold enough to see this film, that is the one thing you will distinctly notice if you've seen the other two- no Atreyu.The boy who played Bastian was not nearly as obnoxious as the actor from the second film, but he just doesn't hold a candle to the original actor, Barret Oliver.

I have only seen this movie once, because I was informed of how awful it was, and just had to see for myself. It was a waste of my precious time. I hardly remember the plot line or anything important like that because it just didn't stick with me. One gets the impression that this was made as a sort of kid/family-friendly approach to The Neverending Story, because it is just so simplistic, and sacrifices the charm of the original characters and settings for the sake of being funny and entertaining. But trust me, it is NOT funny and it is NOT entertaining. Any NES fan worth their salt would be appalled by this film. If however you are not familiar with the Neverending Story, see the original 1984 movie and read the book and be contented with that.

Do not subject yourself to the torturous nightmare that is the Neverending Story 3, I implore you.

As for a star rating out of ten, I give this film nothing. Nil. Zip. Nichts.

This movie was awful, easily one of the worst movies I have ever seen, though not quite as abysmal as Home Alone 4, honestly that film is blasphemy. I love the first NeverEnding Story and consider one of the all time great fantasy films, and the second one while disappointing was pretty good, but this one was garbage. Sorry I hated it, it has none of the magic of the first film, none of the sense of wonder that enthralled me when I first saw NeverEnding Story as a child. The scenery was not at all good, dull and rather tacky, I just wonder whether the producers saw the first film for their inspiration, because actually in the first film, the sumptuous set design should've got an award, for it was fantastic. The script here was dreadful, and the plot was uninspired, and had many inconsistencies with the first film(ie. the omission of Atreyu and anything to do with Bastian's family). Not to mention the rushed ending and the rather cartoonish design of Falcor and his voice(ugh!). Even the acting was poor, Jason James Richter has little of the innocence and heroism and even the likability of Bastian, no matter how hard he tried. Jack Black, who I usually find entertaining was wasted and it doesn't help his character was such an unlikeable jerk, as was the usually brilliant Freddie Jones. All in all, awful, awful, awful! See the first film instead. 1/10 Bethany Cox

We have seen all the NES movies. The 1st was the absolute best!!!!! The second was sub-par. The third was the worst of them all!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Good News: Jack Black Played his character very well. Bad News: Where do we begin? First of all No atreau- Why, we don't know. second, the empress had BLOND hair. Defenatly not the beautiful girl in the first NES.She also looked very stoned. Bastion was an innocent kid with a big imagination. This one looked clueless. Changing his dead mother to his dead father is the worse, most noticeably fault with the story. YOU DO NOT CHANGE THE THE ORIGINAL POINTS OF THE FRANCHISE!!!! Now the fantasia characters. Falcor looked like an anorexic, crack head who must of lost all his knowledge with the pipe. We loved the rock-biter in the first film. But in this he shrunk and had a family (yes we know his son was in the second). If everyone grew up, why didn't didn't the baby? The elves looked horrible. It was good they brought them back, but they ruined the concept of them both. The oracle looked nothing like the first film and neither did the ivory tower.(stone?) They shouldn't started from scratch. The idea of using the real world as a premise was good, but the storyline sucked bad. Only Falcor new what the real world looked like. To try to make us believe that the other fantasia characters knew was laughable to say the least.

Over all they should burn all copies of this movie and use a memory wipe to make us forget this movie ever existed. If we rated this on a scale of 1-10 we would give this a -1000.

Sadly, the running joke of Engywook and Urgl having to go to the bathroom, but being unable to do so, is one of the entertaining things about this film. But it does get tiresome. And the baby rock-biter is cute, if incredibly stupid. But if you have ever seen the first movie, or read the book, you will most likely not care for this movie at all. The plot is poor, Falcore looks extremely cartoonish as do the Rockbiters, and the Nasties...well, they just aren't that scary. Give me Gmork any day, please!

This is a tolerable children's movie ONLY if you have no other knowledge of The Neverending Story.