Children of the Corn (1984)
Directed by Fritz Kiersch
Stephen King is one of the best horror writers ever and many of his stories have been adapted into movies. I have reviewed a few in the past such as Pet Semetary and Misery. Children of the Corn is one of my favorite King movies along with Misery. This story/film touches on the occult, religious brainwashing and even non-conformity. Stephen King’s stories as movies can be kind of hit and miss, so let’s break this one down a little.
The plot centers around Burt (Peter Horton) and Vicky (Linda Hamilton) traveling to Seattle for Burt’s new job as a doctor. Wow this movie could be an odd Grey’s Anatomy tie in. Along the way whilst driving through Nebraska they hit a young boy with their car when Burt realizes the boy was slashed and bleeding to death before he was hit. They load the dead child in the trunk and go to the nearby town of Gatlin to locate police, despite the warning of the crazy mechanic outside the town. When they arrive Burt and Vicky notice that Gatlin is basically a ghost town aside from the overly religious children. The children are lead by Isaac, a 9 year old that is believed to be a prophet. Isaac claims to speak with their god, aka “He who walks behind the rows”. The children blindly follow him and do whatever he is told. Soon Burt and Vicky find themselves fighting for their lives and trying to escape Gatlin.
The story is rather interesting and eerie. At the beginning of the film you see the children slaughter all the adults in the diner and it is mentioned that they continued their murderous rampage throughout Gatlin until every adult was disposed of. They soon become a religious cult based around the “he who walks behind the rows” deity. This deity is bloodthirsty and requires sacrifice. The sacrifices are usually of adults that come into the town and the children when they reach the age of 18. This had me scratching my head and it seems to be an odd plot hole. If the town is completely ran by children whom worship a god that demands sacrifice at the age of 18, then how does their cult continue to exist? Eventually they would all be sacrificed off. What about Isaac? Isaac is the leader; does he have to sacrifice himself at 18 as well? Then what do they do? Do the girls get pregnant very early at the age of 15 or so? It is an odd system if it exists, and kind of gross to be honest. During the film we get the feeling that the town has been ran the same way for a while, but at the beginning the children seem the same age as they do during the main story. Maybe I’m just overanalyzing this. I haven’t read the book so I can’t really shine light on any of these questions.
The acting is fairly decent. Peter Horton and Linda Hamilton are good enough to keep your interest and make you care about their characters. The children however are rather wooden aside from Isaac(John Franklin) and Malachai (Courtney Gains), and really Malachai isn’t all that great. The two little children Job(Robby Kiger) and Sarah(Anne Marie McEvoy) are pretty bad even by 80s child actor standards. Those two are the non-conformists of the society as well as Joseph, the boy hit by Burt with the car. Malachai looks like a mixture of Scott Farkus from A Christmas Story and Meredith’s son from the Office. Wonder if Malachai has attempted to take a dump in the tank of a toilet like Meredith’s son? Upper decker for the win! Gains has been a bunch of movies, probably because of his unique homely look, that’s my guess.
The two things I remember from this movie from watching it at the age of 15 or so is Malachai constantly saying “OUTLANDER!!!!!!” and Peter Horton running a lot. Horton has some awesome 80s poofy hair that flows in the wind while he runs and its rather majestic, Patrick Swayze would be proud Peter! I started thinking during the movie about Linda Hamilton. She was in the Terminator later the same year, where she played the main character of Sarah Connor. I love tying movies together in absurd ways. I like to think her nightmare of a time in Gatlin helped her with her later confrontation with the Terminator. She starts off unable to fight off a group of children then gains the experience and strength to destroy the unstoppable killing robot designed to eradicate the human race. It is rather funny if you think of it. Yeah, I know, I’m an idiot…
The special effects are incredible! Just wow really amazing! Yeah, I’m totally kidding they’re pretty bad and dated for the most part. The scene where Isaac is taken by He Who Walks Behind the Rows is hilarious. I mean, I know the budget was only $800k but this isn’t far from Reptilicus levels, which was made in 1961. Yes, kiddies that is TWO Reptilicus references this year! The blood is kind of lacking in this movie which is fine, and the blood you do see is done rather well. The rumbling of the ground and the animation of the corn is good and believable. It was 1984 and made on a super low budget so I can excuse most things, except the blobby Reptilicus-esque scenes. The music is very creepy for the most part. It is kind of hard to explain but its basically just one song continuing through the whole film, with children doing saying “ah ah ah ah ahhhhhhhhhhh ah ah”. Like I said, hard to explain just find it on youtube.
Is it corny? (pun intended?) Yes, it is cheesetastic, but it is definitely entertaining and probably better than it should have been with the low budget. Although the movie strays from the novel, the story is kind of interesting and the above average (for the genre) acting helps elevate the movie from some of the less noteworthy King adaptations. Relatively short at 92 minutes, Children of the Corn is a good movie to take in quickly this Halloween season. I believe it is still on Netflix as of now. I happened to have the bluray that I received earlier this year from Horror Pack. If you’re a big horror fan check out Horror Pack they will send you 4 DVDs or Blurays of random horror movies each month, for around $20. I would recommend this to anyone looking for something new, it is genuinely creepy and entertaining. Children of the Corn gets a B from me. It is fun and I’ve seen it a few times, but it isn’t great and not one of my favorites but as far as Stephen King adaptations go, you could do a lot worse!
