Scanners III: Puissance maximum

A young female scanner turns from a sweet young thing into a murderous, power-crazed villain after she takes an experimental drug developed by her father. Her brother, who is also a scanner, is the only one powerful enough to stop her.

We start out with the standard good and evil plot, brother against sister... but, in all fairness, this is a plot structure that works. From there, it actually gets much more creative, introducing the use of Eastern meditation to control the scanning and the use of TV to more widely broadcast scanning.

Some memorable moments are here, too, including the mind-control dance scene, the Taiwanese boxing and plenty of firefights and explosions, including an arm that flies off.

As with "Scanners II", this definitely could have been a series, even more than the last film. The ideas developed here really set up a broader picture of good scanners against bad ones, and how such powers could be used not just on a combat level, but to actually infiltrate and dominate society. There is much potential.

It seemed to have been a curse of good 80's films with exploitable theme to sink ever lower depth, cheaper effects and amateurish actors, the more Roman numerals one would attach to them. Remember "RoboCop"? Half-decent sequel, a third part that reeked. "Warlock"? Cult-classic first part, mediocre second, unwatchable third. "Highlander"? "American Ninja"? "Batman"? The list could go on.

"Scanners III" neatly fits into that mould; the original being a true classic, the second part a cartoonish but enjoyable romp and the third, well, it makes you glad they didn't film a third "The Fly"-film (although an African video-vendor tried to sell me a bootleg of "The Fly III", but that's another story).

Short story shorter: a pair of Scanner siblings, one good one who has learned to control his powers and his evil sister, who chemically boosts her powers in order to take over the world, battle it out with the usual Scanner abilities. The powers are stronger, the theatrics – mostly due to the lack of acting abilities – are even more theatrical but the human-factor of the original "Scanners" has left the franchise forever. The original Scanners were mostly portrayed as average people who had to deal both with a power and a disease. One felt for their misery and, through the minimalist approach of original director David Cronenberg, one could almost imagine those people were troubled, but real people. The Scanners of this film seem like comic book heroes (and villains) who might well have fitted in with some cheap TV-production of "Super Friends".

This film isn't even cartoon anymore; it's the purest of C-grade straight-to-video Dreck. But there's the golden 80's principle and the producers had a concept there: most of the fans still slavishly rented or purchased the film, same as they did with "Scanner Cop" and "Scanner Cop II". I know I did. And I watched all the RoboCops because, you never know, there might be a shine of former brilliance to surface yet. People, we've all been conned. Will I go watch another sequel or a remake? Sure, I'm an incorrect able sucker for franchises and plan to stick to that – one can always complain later.

And by the way: when in East-Africa and they somebody tries to sell you a video-copy of "The Fly III", don't buy it! It's just a cheap horror-film, left on the cutting board table somewhere in Hong Kong, about a woman who stings herself on a mutated plant and gives birth to a giant killer-bug. Trust me: I know what I'm talking about! Four points for the film, one for nostalgia.

Christian Duguay directed in 1991 "Scanners II: The New Order", that same year he directed a third part, "Scanners III: The Takeover". The second film was amazing but this third part is weak, some good acting and gore, interesting scenes but the film is not that good, the comedy used in some moments is stupid. The script could be better. "Scanners" and "Scanners II: The New Order" are great films, but "Scanners III: The Takeover" is not good but not that bad either.

Scanners were the offspring of women that were given a drug during pregnancy. They had severe mental and emotional problems, but one great power: the ability to blow someone else's brains up if you pissed them off. I did not see Scanners II, but by number III they not only got the ability to use psychokinesis, but to control others actions--even over the television.

One brother went to a monastery in Thailand to learn to control his powers, while his father gave his sister an experimental drug that gave her the same powers instantly (but for only 24 hours while wearing a patch). She becomes power mad and uses them to take over her father's drug company and next the world?

Her brother finds out about his relatives deaths and returns. His sister has released a bunch of drug enhanced Scanners as hit men to prevent his displacing her.

The final battle reveals which approach is stronger--it is not as straight forward as you think.

Just like in Scanners (I), not enough of what scanners were famous for--blowing up heads. How expensive can this special effect be anyway?

This movie is not a bad waste of viewing time and the sister is not hard on the eyes -- one brief nude scene in a hot tub.

Let me start out by saying that this is a wonderful film. When I rented this movie initially I thought that it was going to be one of those low budget action films with awful special effects, terrible dialogue, terrible plot and gratuitous nudity (like the highlander movies). I was dead wrong.

Scanners III is a wonderfully cerebral film, chock full of allusions and references to American folklore, popular science fiction novels of the past century (i.e. 1984 and just about everything by Michael Chricton), Huey Lewis and The News song lyrics (I've got a brand new drug) and the religion and philosophy of the Algonquin Indians. What an analytical treat!!

As the iconography in this film suggests, American culture is dominated by the media, the pharmecutical companies, and cheap dares we do to impress girls on Saturday nights. We are soulless zombies, only acting on impulses that have been passed down to us by our parents. If we only used our heads (as Alex Monet does in this film (monet is an obvious reference to the french impressionistic artist...there are many more delicious reference-goodies in this gem!)), we could overcome the social and mental chains that are hindering us from developing as a society.

The film is beckoning us to cast away homburg hats and black suits of the nineteen forties for more casual clothing, eschew hot concentual sex with busty mental-hospital nurses for passionate lovemaking with loved ones, to send christianity and all of western society to the junkyard and take up Tibetan Buddhism, the only religion that has the capability to give one enough strength to overcome one's weaknesses. In no way is this film just another sequel to David Cronenberg's far inferior film Scanners. This is a treatise on how to live life successfully. I urge you to watch it immediately.