Beginning of the End: Third Installment in Spanish Horror Series Morphs Into Banal Comedy

Every successful franchise eventually runs into a final chapter that miserably bungles the magic formula that made its predecessor(s) so damn fruitful. And the third entry in any series has the tricky tightrope act of logically continuing (or predating) material while also delivering something original, bigger and better than the bigger better already used in the first sequel. There are very few commendable cinematic examples, and the extremely entertaining and creepy Rec films from Spain have fallen over the jagged precipice of one sequel too many with Rec 3: Genesis.

Set on the very same evening of the first two Rec films, a wedding ceremony is taking place miles away from the doomed, infected apartment complex of the first two films. A member of the wedding was exposed to the virus setting off the...