Last year, between the two of us, we watched an average of 317 movies.
This year our goal is to top that by watching at least one a day.
And as an extra special torture, we've decided to write about all of them.

08 February 2008

Children of the Corn, dir. Fritz Kiersch (1984)

NIKKI says:
After watching The Mist, we thought we might have another look at some other Stephen King adaptations in our collection. I think I have already blocked the conversation that led to our selection here. You see, I'm systematically attempting to block the entire experience from my mind. Hopefully, Isaac screaming "They want you, too, Malachai!!!" will be the next thing to go.

What the fuck? I remember watching this movie as kid and thinking it was too cool. I know I've seen it more than once in my life, but I'm shocked at how little of it I actually held on to. Perhaps my brain knew how bad it was and started to erase the film by itself? I'd forgotten about "he who walks behind the rows" actually being real, which is, like, the main part of the movie. I remember bits of it -- the Monopoly game, a few random stabbings, Malachai and his scythe. I'd also forgotten, I guess, about the rampant plot holes, the narration to no-one that abruptly ceases once the story kicks in, and the heinous overacting by everyone involved.

The poster says "the original that started it all". I'm wondering now if that means the Corn series, which is up to about 13 by now. Or the long, growing run of horrible King adaptations?

1/5

STEVE says:
So incredibly bad. Where does one start?

King's short story opened with Burt and Vicky arguing as they drive toward Gatlin, Nebraska, and running down a child when Burt's attention was somewhere other than on the road. As the story progresses, they learn that the kid had been killed before they hit him with the car, and that the town of Gatlin is now a ghost town. Except for the children. They further learn that the children killed their parents, and subsequently offer themselves to He Who Walks Behind The Rows on the last night of their 18th year. Pretty creepy.

This shitefest of a movie opens with the slaying of the parents, removing any mystery or suspense from the story at about the three-minute mark. When Vicky and Burt are introduced, it's in an "aren't they cute together" scene in a motel room, which makes their arguing in the car a bit confounding. During all this, the film is narrated by Jobe, an 8 year old Child of said Corn, but his narration disappears half-way through the movie, and as he and his sister, Sarah, leave town with Burt and Vicky in the end, one is left to wonder just who the hell he's telling this story to in the first place.

Listen, I know it was only a 20 page short story, and that it's bound to take a lot of padding to flesh it out to a feature length movie, but one hopes that such padding would amount to more than just Peter Horton slinking around a barn for 20 minutes, and a prolonged scene at a creepy gas station that does nothing whatsoever to further the plot.

There was no excuse for this, let alone the seven sequels.

1/5