THE SKULLS III

Taylor Brooks, a young college student, wants to join the secret society of the Skulls, of which no woman has ever been a member. After convincing the Council to let her participate in an initiation ritual, Taylor will find herself involved in a spiral of deceit and murders. It is often said that "the worst is never over," and we get confirmation of this saying from "The Skulls III," which has managed the unenviable feat of being worse than the already bad second chapter. If "The Skulls II" already seemed, after the first film, like a project whose realization was hardly justifiable, a third episode has all the characteristics of a senseless operation. As with its predecessor, we remain in the realm of direct-to-video with means and content probably even poorer. The story has only one variation: this time the protagonist is a girl, determined to be the first woman to be admitted into the "Skulls." The attempt to give credibility to the protagonist's mission gives rise to one of the most ridiculous aspects of an already poor and incoherent screenplay; to enter the association, Taylor brings up legal norms and historical research... it's a shame that the "Skulls" should be a secret society about which no one should know anything, of which there should be no trace at all, and—above all—for which common jurisprudence should have no kind of relevance! Except for the protagonist's gender, the story remains the same as in the previous films: after great efforts, the girl is admitted, she will witness something—at the hands of those "bad guys" of the "Skulls"—that she should not have seen, and in her attempt to shed light on the matter, she will risk her own life. In this case as well, there is no connection to the previous film except, of course, in the main subject, namely the society of the "Skulls." The umpteenth repetition of the society's rituals is meant to provide familiar elements to the saga's audience, but unfortunately, beyond these elements, the entire script faithfully reproduces those of the previous chapters with the aggravating circumstance of a further qualitative decline. The film is bad, poorly acted by mediocre and unknown actors, and directed in a monotonous and ultra-television-like manner. The boredom does not let up for the viewer; one struggles to reach the end, and the excessive length of 102 minutes certainly does not help. However, a separate discussion should be had about the Italian version and its dubbing. If the film is already trash on its own, the scandalous Italian dubbing manages—where it seemed impossible—to make it even worse. First of all, we are dealing with dubbers who do not act but merely read almost without any emphasis, but the most absurd thing is that they are foreigners speaking Italian! Almost all—they might all be—the characters speak Italian with a strange English accent; it's almost as if we are listening to dialogues between Heather Parisi and Don Lurio! At first glance, one might think of a script requirement—how many times in the Italian adaptation of an English/American film does the foreign character of the moment get dubbed in Italian while keeping the accent of their country of origin?—but the doubt is immediately dispelled. This is a film set in the States, whose characters are all Americans; the dubbing is identical for everyone; it would make no sense as a deliberate choice, so someone should tell us what strange phenomenon occurred during the dubbing and who had the brilliant idea of choosing foreign dubbers for Italian dialogues. Given the dubbing disaster, probably unprecedented, we might even recommend watching it just to witness—or perhaps it would be better to say hear—the absurdity of the situation with your own eyes—or rather, ears. In conclusion, we are faced with a trash film in every respect; boredom and annoyance accompany the viewer throughout the viewing, at the end of which it will be possible to breathe a sigh of relief. The only "merit" of "The Skulls III" is that it is the last chapter of the saga: fortunately, after this third episode, they understood that it was time to stop!