The original Purge movie was an anomaly for Platinum Dunes it wasnt flat, sluggish or a remake, so you can see why the company turned it into a franchise. Or you could look at it this way: if The Purge was director James DeMonacos tribute to Assault On Precinct 13 (he scripted the remake, after all) and The Purge: Anarchy was his tribute to Escape From New York, will The Purge 3 pay homage to They Live? There's some potential for satire in DeMonaco's script, which picks up 2 years after the events depicted in Anarchy. Frank Grillo's cop character, who's still billed as "Sergeant", is now the head of security for a Senator with Presidential ambitions who, through a variety of contrivances, ends up on the streets on the night of The Purge. So the privileged end up fighting the poor in order to survive, a premise that offers more food for thought than you'd expect in a sequel. Will it be the best movie in the franchise or just a rehash of Anarchy? Find out in July.
Ian Watson is the author of 'Midnight Movie Madness', a 600+ page guide to "bad" movies from 'Reefer Madness' to 'Poultrygeist: Night of the Chicken Dead.'
