Killing 9 To 5

It’s been seven months since I last watched Severance and nearly one year since I began my first actual office job. Having now suffered through dry meetings scored to the buzz of overhead lighting and office scandals regarding lunch orders, I’m truly shocked by the lack of horror films that utilize a corporate setting. Where’s the weapon arsenal sponsored by Staples and uncomfortably ill-defined relationship barriers riddled with career-climbing ulterior motives? 

Hence, when the 1997 issue of Fangoria I recently bought at a yard sale featured an article about Office Killer, I rearranged my Netflix queue faster than you can say coffee break. Directed by famed photographer Cindy Sherman and starring an impressivey miscellaneous cast, Netflix defined it as “a thriller with surprising hilarity,” which should have quickly warned me that a genre film I had never heard of was buried in time for a reason.

Quick Plot: The always intriguing Carol Kane plays Dorine, an efficient copy editor (and if my boss is reading, allow me to assure the world that ALL copy editors are efficient) who lives a lonely existence with her invalid mother and chubby cat. At work, supervisor Jeanne Tripplehorn (who may have been in 65% of films released in the mid-late 90s) hands out downsizing slips instructing employees that they’ll now have to work part-time from home, much to the horror of the workaholic Dori. Meanwhile, surprisingly non Jersey accented Michael Imperioli (yes, Christophuh himself) puts in some IT hours installing this revolutionary new office tool called "email" on the employees' home computers. The world is a changing place.  

While working late to meet a deadline, Dori’s verbally abusive and hair abusing boss electrocutes himself while trying to fix an internet connection. Instead of calling 911, Dori decides to break the all sorts of rules by stealing the ultimate office supply--the corpse of her supervisor.  


A few days later, Dori once again finds herself alone with a rude and authority drunk superior, this one an asthmatic chain smoker with a dangerous comfort level in pleather evening wear. Spike an inhaler with a little butane and Dori is on a killing roll, always in less than expected manner and with a slight comic edge. Corpses pile up in her basement to be posed, dismembered, and Febrezed. Only Molly Ringwald as a cynical secretary with poor fashion sense suspects the suddenly confident grammar expert of being less than a model employee.  

Everything I’d read about Office Killer made it seem like a film I would love. Unfortunately, nearly everything about it just doesn’t work. Sherman has a definitive visual stle, casting the entire film in a sad and stale orangey brown that makes everything inside look rusted. By today’s standards, such a choice feels stuffily uncomfortable but also, oddly outdated a mere 12 years later. Instead of the icy uniformity done so well in films like Office Space, Office Killer’s title setting just feels messy. Even a low level publisher heading into the red wouldn't feel as if a retirement home was converted into magazine headquarters.  


More troubling is the tone, or lack thereof. Most of the characters are flat stereotypes which could certainly have worked had the film known what to do with them. Instead of forging ahead into campy wickedness, Office Killer sits on its unpleasant cast without any intrigue. Sometimes it seems as though Tripplehorn is our heroine, while Kane’s manic Dori bounces back and forth between sympathetic shut-in and psychopathic murderess. It’s fun to watch her chide the corpses of Girl Scouts, but when we have no idea why she killed these little girls in the first place, why should we care? Fuzzy narration and a few flashbacks hint at sexual abuse (and hey, if said sexual abuser was Eric Bogosian, I too would probably grow up with more than a few issues) but nothing’s really done with that thread. Ultimately, it feels as though the script presented a premise that called for sharp black comedy, while the director treated it straightforwardly with a static eye. It’s hard to laugh at jokes that feel flatter than the page they were typed on and even harder to fear for characters that lack the slightest hint of depth.  


High Points 
While she seems to have no idea what to do with her poorly drawn character, Kane is still an intriguing presence in just about any film she's in

Following her divaliscious turn in the Aussie slasher Cut , Ringwald has convinced me that she should henceforth only accept roles that call for serious bitchery 


Low Points 
What’s the point of featuring a motorized Gremlins stair chair if you’re not going to use it?

Um, the rest of the movie?  

Lessons Learned 
The Internet might occasionally kill you, but it’s pretty easy to hack


Masking tape is great in a pinch, especially if said pinch involved holding in a corpse's intestines

Never feel up your daughter while driving

Like mace, a silk headscarf with an elaborate and too colorful print can indeed be used against you


When in doubt, always say no to pleather


Rent/Bury/Buy 
The female factor of Office Killer makes it interesting in concept, but this is sadly one of duller 90+ minutes I’ve recently endured. I have the slight feeling that it may, like many dark comedies, improve a bit on repeat viewings but I have absolutely no desire to revisit this film and unless you’re nursing a Carol Kane crush, I’d skip it. The DVD contains no special features, so despite the fact that this film feels deliberately cultish, it seems nobody involved in its production cared enough to come back.  

I know how they feel.

See Me, Feel Me, Touch Me, Eat Me

Having gorged on my share of highly fattening Italian zombie cinema (I'm still picking the cheese and intestines out of my teeth), I didn't expect much from Spanish filmmaker's Amando de Ossorio's Knights of Templar series. Yes, I'm clearly an ignorant American who can't tell the difference between Europeans. Thankfully, 1971's Tombs of the Blind Dead, the first entry in this four-film set, has its own refreshing take on the undead mythos complete with a slow and spooky tone that actually left me unsettled. Yay.

Quick Plot: While on vacation in Lisbon with her swinger-ready boyfriend Roger, thirtysomething Virginia bumps into her former college roommate/tepid ex-lover Betty (you know, 'cause all female coeds "experiment"). They quickly catch up and Roger, clad in the world's most pimpin' bathrobe, invites the attractive mannequin factory owner to a couples' camping trip and train ride. Annoyed at Roger's shameless flirtation, Virginia leaps off board and decides to spend the night in an abandoned medieval town which unfortunately enough, happens to be occupied by a band of crusty, Ghost of Christmas Past-ish monsters. Our bland brunette makes a valiant effort to escape, but once the shamblers hitch up on horseback, the poor lass doesn't stand a chance.

Back in the civilized world of Portuguese society, Betty and Roger visit the world's laxest morgue to identify the body of their friend/lost third in the threesome that wasn't. Later that evening, Virginia's corpse awakens to take a bite out of the slightly sadistic coroner's assitant. Betty and Roger visit the town historian (about as quaint a film profession as a candlestick maker or milkman, but anyway) and learn that the village is haunted by the the Knights of Templar, a power-abusing group of noblemen who sacrificed virgins (well, whipped them to near death then sucked blood out of their nude bodies) to Satan in return for eternal life. Legend has it that the townspeople strung up the naughty knights and left their deaths at the hands--or beaks--of eye-pecking crows.

It's a great setup for a different breed of monster, but the real beauty of Tombs of the Blind Dead is how sparingly Ossorio uses his shuffling man-eaters. There is no real mass feasting we've become used to seeing in similarly styled films of the time, but the attacks are incredibly effective due to the careful choices made to build each scene. A creepy soundtrack cues up medieval monk chanting as these giant grim reapers gallop atop white stallions. Since the knights are blind and hunt by sound, our characters are forced to play Marco Polo rounds of life or death. The score sometimes kicks in at the wrong times, but it's refreshing to watch a film that doesn't rely on gigantically overblown sound cues to tell us danger is a'comin.


I didn't notice just how invested I was in this film until one of the final scenes. I won't spoil a film that I recommend you seek out, but let's just say that I caught myself holding my breath as our heroine attempts to crawl to safety with a horde of horse-riding dead soldiers silently in pursuit. Even though that's the kind of emotion horror films are, by definition, supposed to be riling up, it's hard to remember the last time I felt so on edge in an actual moment of action.


High Points
An early attack in a freaky mannequin workshop (no, there is no other type) is sufficiently suspenseful in an almost Hammer Horror style

The sole special feature is pretty damn amazing: an alternate prologue that explains how man once rose up against his simian oppressors by poking out their eyes and seizing control of planet earth. That's right: in order to cash in on a big little 1968 adventure, an alternate title for Tombs of the Blind Dead was Revenge From Planet Ape. The absurdity is a beautiful thing


Low Points
It's a horror cliche that I'll never accept: so you work alone late at night in a mortuary. No stereo, no traffic, or any other ambient noise of any type. How do you not hear the sound of a body dismounting from its gurney as it approaches the back of your neck for a midnight snack?



Character was clearly an afterthought to the script. While Lone Fleming gets to dig a little deep with Betty's confused sexuality, some of the plot choices by other actors feel a little too silly to believe

Lessons Learned
When the world gets as quiet as it can possibly be, you will hear the obnoxiously deafening sound of your own heart beat. So will the zombies.


Decorators are harmless


In order to sway a criminal smuggler to accompany you on a dangerous mission into a haunted town, simply bait him with subtle hints that he may be slightly nervous. Sample approach:
Badass Criminal: I won't go.
Metrosexual: I understand. Are you afraid?
Badass Criminal: I'm coming!


Contrary to popular belief, not all women enjoy a smoke after being raped


Rent/Bury/Buy 
With its carefully drawn atmosphere and unique spin on an easy genre, Tombs of the Blind Dead was an exciting surprise for me. If the entire series maintained this level of quality, I'd suggest a buy; however, most reports I've heard seem to single out this film as head and shoulders above the other three. Having not yet seen these movies, I personally can't speak to that but I would plan a Netflix sampler before putting heavy money into this set.

Important Note: The Blue Underground DVD offers you two cuts of the film: Tombs of the Blind Dead, in dubbed English, and La Noche del Terror Ciego, in Spanish with subtitles. Being lazy and of worsening eyesight, I started with Tombs but quickly realized that something was off. If a young virgin is being stripped and torn apart in an exploitation flick, would the filmmakers really be so restrained as to not show her bosoms? Sure enough, the Spanish version is a gorily nude 14 minutes longer and apparently much more fluid than the chopped up American cut. Without question, put on your reading glasses and watch this one (even if, like me, you have your own boobs and don't necessarily require a few shots of prosthetically chewed up ones). Just don't forget to switch back to Tombs to check out the insanely wonderful attempt to ride the ape train. 

How to Succeed In Sequels

More than any other film genre, horror has thrived--and sometimes shriveled--with the onslaught of sequels. From forced character crossovers to flashback riddled running times (is there even ten minutes of original content between the first round of followups to The Hills Have Eyes and Silent Night, Deadly Night?), it’s easy to mess up a sequel. But you know what? Pumpkins are in season, I'm high on candy corn, and the positivity is pumping, so let’s instead take a moment to consider some of the smart choices sequels have made in continuing a good story: 

Expanded Mythology

The true beauty of a sequel is that it can take a premise people found interesting the first go ‘round and attack it from a new angle, such as the Cenobite-heavy chambers of Hellraiser II. While it's true that many a sequel runs the risk of revealing too much (thereby negating some of the mystery that occasionally defines a first film) others seize upon the potential. Eli Roth's Hostel, for example, was a better idea than film, but his followup used the now established setup of a capitalist torture show to fully explore what audiences were drawn to in the first place. Instead of wasting time with standard protagonists, Roth gave us a briefer intro to much more likable women, then promptly delved into Elite Hunting and its own financiers. The result was a quick moving and smartly done film that found just the right note to revisit Slovakia.

Other films are less successful, but not always in a sacrilegious way. The philosophically horrific Cube series debuted as one of the most surprisingly intriguing films of the ‘90s, while a few straight-to-cable/dvd sequels attempted to take an incredible concept and try it with a different recipe. Cube 2 :Hypercube plays with the math, hints at its origin, and shoots itself with a horrid title worth of an Atari game while Cube Zero (arguably a prequel) goes behind the scenes to pose new questions. Neither is anywhere near as satisfying as Vincenzo Natali's original, which works precisely because we ultimately know nothing but what our own fears project. Still, if you watch Parts 2 & 3 as if they’re pieces of fan fiction blown up to feature length, both work on their own terms, sort of ‘what-ifs’ to a question that should never actually be answered.

Remakes In Sequels’ Designer Clothing

The world would be a far less groovy place had Sam Raimi ended the adventures of Ash in 1981. Yes, The Evil Dead is a great gooey film, but it's his first sequel that cements Bruce Campbell's status as an icon among the undead. Only quibble? It's not really a sequel if the first half hour retells the original story.

Sometimes, a filmmaker decides that directing a second film is code for second chance. In the case of The Evil Dead, this minor lapse of originality works because Raimi takes the good and makes it better with more money. We forgive the fact that Ash and Linda had already made a fateful trip to that cabin in the woods because even within the constraints of the same story, Raimi uses such a different energy that we end up with a completely different film not only from its original, but from just about every other film that had come before it.

Keep the Story Consistent

Say what you want about the juggernaut success of the Saw series, but has there ever been a 6 film franchise with such an excessively complicated spiderweb of a plot? Haters like to attack Lions Gate’s posterchild for its grisly suspenseless violence and contrived characters, but I continue to argue that this is, in many ways, one of the tightest (at least by script) franchises in the horror genre. With occasional flashbacks (and inventive ways to utilize the now deceased Jigsaw himself), each film has continued the story with something of a six degrees of separation mentality. A minor character from Part 2 returns to head Part 4, while missing characters reappear with believable, if somewhat logistically stretched explanations as to their whereabouts. I imagine the upcoming installment will have two audiences: those that have followed the five previous films and are still waiting for answers about Jigsaw's wife, the contents of a mysterious box, and the protagonists of Part III’s daughter (who’s been missing, but acknowledged in the last two films) while the other half will simply slurp their sodas through exposition and cheer at the latest rusted torture contraption. In a way, everybody wins. Except for oddly vast majority of horror fans who like to brand Saw the antichrist of filmdom. 

...or Dare To Be Different

Franchises are generally defined by their formula, whether it be pretty teenagers + machetes or redheaded dolls + profanity. Every so often, however, some series take a chance by breaking from the fold (even Chucky changed his act with married life). Though initially panned by critics and ignored by audiences, Halloween III: Season of the Witch has slowly aged to prove itself the most memorable of all those October 31st celebrating films. Admittedly, that’s not much of a feat when its competition included Michael Meyers’ worshipping cults and Tyra Banks, but still: abandoning Meyers for an evil corporation wielding head-melting dime store masks was a daring move well before its time. Likewise, the majority of Elm Street fans tend to use Part 2 as a coaster for their Hypnocil spiked Red Bull, but the sheer fact that such a random entry exists in an otherwise formulaic series is in itself somewhat notable. (Also, it’s one of the most fascinatingly homoerotic/homophobic films of all time, but that’s a discussion save for another day).

Jump Right In

Look, if we’re watching a film with 2, II, or the words “The Return” in the title, you can probably trust that we’ve been here before. Thankfully, the better sequels understand that audiences don’t need heavy exposition to get the kills rolling. Note how starting from Dawn to Land,George Romero’s Dead films never wasted time explaining the oncoming zompocalypse. Similarly, 28 Weeks Later boasts one of the most terrifyingly exciting openings in recent years by immediately thrusting us back into a nightmarish world we know all too well. 

There are plenty more notable sequel rules for continuing a franchise, so add some of your own and let the Freddy Vs. Jason style fights begin!

Ants In My Bell Bottoms

Childhood is a fickle mistress. As a young lass growing up in the 80s, I spent many a day pitting Mr. Potato Head Kids against Smurfs, always with a VHS loaded and rolling in the background. One of those stalwarts of those recorded-off-cable days was Bert I. Gordon's Empire of the Ants, a 1977 monster movie loosely based on an H.G. Wells novel. Though I don't recall the film ever giving me nightmares, I had convinced myself that it was a well-done creature feature with a killer premise and frightening execution.

Wow. How our impressions change. Not that Empire of the Ants isn't enjoyable--my goodness is it entertaining....just not for the reasons I recall.

Quick Plot: Joan Collins divas it up as Marilyn Fryser, president of some land selling scam where wealthy fools are wined and dined in the hopes that they'll purchase a few acres of glorified swamp. Her Bruce Campbell lookalike boyfriend helps out while a surly sea captain huffs away with a no nonsense eye and even more no nonsense beard. The guests include a mildly would-be rapist, a penny pinching couple dressed in matching Kermit the Frog suits (not really, but kind of really), a drunken Joe David Carson, who seems like quite the catch to the spurned woman blond, a recently fired secretary fishing for sympathy and a lucrative investment, and a few other bodies tossed in to bland soap operatic effect. 

Oh yeah, and giant carnivorous ants that range in height from even with your knees to larger than a small yacht. By range in height, I don't mean workers vs. soldiers. Sometimes an ant approaches a character from a wide shot appearing to be the size of an RV trailer only to then shrink in closeup to be smaller than a yellow lab. This all depends on which effect is being used: are the ants actual live creatures climbing their way over, I kid you not, blown-up photographs of the set, or have the filmmakers switched back to the leftover animatronics used to much more terrifying effect in Them!?

For the first hour, our characters get some memorable chase scenes through a rainy jungle. Naturally, the caddish horndog leaves his wife to be eaten (because there’s no way a movie like this could resist featuring a helpless woman with a twisted ankle) while Bruce Campbell saves Joan only to then, well, be eaten. A guy can't win. A nice twist gets tossed in towards the third act when we meet the queen, whose talents are far more impressive than just laying eggs or doing the cupped hand wave. Sadly the film doesn’t quite capitalize on its human slavery/giant sugar bowl potential, but that’s not to say it doesn’t try.

Watching Empire of the Ants for the first time in probably 18 years, I can see why I would have loved this as a kid. The effects are ridiculous, but not dull. After a slowish opening that establishes every one dimensional character's sole dimension, the action is pretty steady, with a brief break to turn the story in a different direction. In no way is the film ever scary, but the cheese tastes good enough to melt over fries and enjoy with a beer. After all, this is coming from a director responsible for not one, not three, but EIGHT films (more than a few from the Gigantic Animal genre) prominently featured in memorable episodes of Mystery Science Theater 3000. The fact that Empire of the Ants managed to evade this may be its biggest accomplishment.

High Points

This isn't exactly something to be proud of from the filmmaker's point of view, but every time I heard the blatantly Jaws-ish soundtrack cues, I laughed like a schoolgirl

Ants are inherently disconcerting, what with their socialist attitude and unionizing abilities. Despite the middle school project quality if the special effects, the mere sight of a few ant closeups does make even the Amazing Colossal Man wrinkle his nose in minor discomfort

Low Points

The ant attacks basically involve shaking the camera while an actor "wrestles" a giant ant doll. Do the ants eat the bodies? It's unclear. One character seems to die because she's poked by an antennae. A little more specifics (am I really saying this?) on the ants' abilities would have been useful

So ants’ vision is the equivalent of covering a camera lens with a mesh t-shirt?

The lack of English subtitles wouldn't be so annoying if the audio wasn't so muffled, which is even more frustrating when the ants’ screams and beeps (because apparently ants scream and beep) weren't so painfully shrill and loud

Lessons Learned

Being nearly raped by a stranger should not in any way discourage you from pursuing the kinder eyed alcoholic stranger standing alone in the corner

Favorite cuisines of the ant world include sugar, radioactive waste, and people

The best way to assert yourself is to bite into an especially crunchy piece of celery

Contrary to many beliefs, candy does not make everything better

This one's for the ladies: in order to survive an army of killer ants, hedge your bets and latch yourself onto the right man 


Only those that are great in the sack should expect a justifiably high salary, at least if your boss is Joan Collins

Rent/Bury/Buy

Why this DVD's sole special feature is a far too revealing trailer I don't know, but Empire of the Ants is a fun ride for those fans of 70s cheese and, well, giant killer ants. Best rented from your local library or streamed via Hulu and certainly not for those without a sense of humor about their insect politics. A double feature DVD is out there with Tentacles, a film I haven't seen nor heard any recommendations regarding. Empire of the Ants won't creep its way into your nightmares, but it will make you smile enough for 90 minutes to warrant a lower real estate valued place in your collection.

But remember the tagline warning: it's no picnic!

Man, sometimes I really wish I was alive in the 70s.

This Land Is Your Land, This Land Is Zombieland

Anybody notice that sunny glow shining through the Monday blues? Was it a lingering effect from the full harvest moon of Sunday night? The crispy bite of autumn in the air? Or maybe, just maybe, it was the musty smell of crinkled $10 bills and stoic scent of credit card swipes mixed with the buttery aroma of movie theater popcorn.

In case you hadn’t heard, Zombieland premiered and results were good. Not quite Dawn of the Dead ’09 taking a bite out of zombie Jesus in Passion of the Christ good, but $25 million in October is good news for original horror humor, especially following the disappointing opening of the R-Rated Jennifer’s Body. 

Especially because, in case you haven’t heard the movie is pretty damn wonderful. So wonderful and nearly universally approved (89% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes !) that rather than do a traditional Doll’s House style review and risk echoing the herd or revealing spoilers, I figured I’d just throw out a few recommendations for who to see it when you see it again (because you know you will) and how to convince them to do so:

-Your children, because it reinforces the importance of wearing a seatbelt

-Your out-of-touch uncle because he’ll finally understand the difference between Hannah Montana and Miley Cyrus

-Your sister, because the film heavily feature a close and sweet relationship between two feisty sibs

-Your Ultimate Edition DVD set of Dawn of the Dead so that you can fold the box and make it smile at the very subtle (possibly produced by my own hopes) soundtrack homage during Zombieland’s trash-the-wampum store scene

-Your mother, because you love her and want to see her happy

-Your clown-fearing cousin, because it’s time to feel empowered

-Your Showgirls enthusiast aunt because she’s never seen tassel turns until she’s seen them in undead slow motion

-Anyone you know, because everyone else is doing it and people don’t like to feel left out

You get the point. If there was one low point to first time filmmaker/my new hero Ruben Fleischer’s zomcom, it’d be that a gal could always use more zombie kills hinted at so wonderfully in the terrifically macabre opening. And Emma Stone’s hair looks way too shiny in a world where deep conditioning has taken a backseat to other priorities. High points? Woody Harrelson doing what he does best, the use of a Crazy Mouse roller coaster, constructive lessons that read like a live action reenactment of Max Brooks’ The Zombie Survival Guide, and one of the best extended cameos ever to included on camera.

Do yourself a favor and throw a few bucks to a good cause. See Zombieland now before everyone and their great grandfather spills the celebrity guest star and/or starts to rattle off Jessie Eisenberg’s rules as if they’ve just discovered the secret to life, which of course, you as a horror enthusiast have known all along. Whatever your reasons, just have fun.

And of course, be sure to limber up.

Kid Nation

Stephen King’s Children of the Corn is a superb little piece of fiction offering a terrifying portrait of middle America, fundamentalist religion, and the horror of combining kids with power and ideas they don’t really understand. For the last 25 years, filmmakers have been trying--with varying levels of success and several stop-bys of soon-to-be huge Hollywood actresses--to capture what worked in under 25 pages. While some have had their moments, none have actually brought all the potential terror of sunny cornfields and cultish little kids to the screen.

And that tradition continues with the SyFy Channel original, Children of the Corn. While this remake (well, really just second adaptation of the source material) comes the closest to following King’s original work (it’s based in part on his original screenplay penned back in the days of big hair and leg warmers), it stumbles in a several patches of plot, character, and effects choices. 

Quick Plot: It's 1963 and the children of Gatlin are unionizing, Old Testament style. Led by a kid preacher dressed like Willy Wonka’s Mike TV, they seem to agree that the sins of adults are polluting the corn. A pig is sacrificed, the film flashes forward 12 years, and viewers bemoan the loss of the diner massacre so effective in the 1984 version.

Hateful couple Vicky and Burt are driving cross country towards their divorce and, we hope, brutal death. I have nothing against bickering characters or unhappily married folks realistically arguing, but when a man slaps a woman and you want to buy him a beer, you know there's a problem. Anyway, Burt's a proud Vietnam veteran and Vicky is a former prom queen (the fact that they're an interracial couple in 1975 is never really discussed) who hates everything in life. During one of their many arguments, Burt hits a young boy with his car.

Yes, the blood comes from Burt's Chevy, but the gash on the victim's neck was clearly pre-administered. Thirty years away from a cell phone, Vicky and Burt load up the body and head to the nearest town--Gatlin, a seemingly abandoned but very devout little hamlet rich in religious imagery (including a psychedelic mural depicting He Who Walks Behind the Rows as a stern Jerry Garcia), the pitter patter of smaller feet, and creepiness. If you've seen any of the previous CotC films, you know that those large hat wearing kiddies are not living in an Amish Paradise.

Unlike most remakes, the concept of re-doing this story was rife with potential. The original film, while highly flawed, did a spectacular job of creating an eerily devout clan of children living in the heartland of America. It failed not in its horror, but in the forced Hollywoodness of the rest: cute kid heroes, romantically happy leads, and an ending growing moldy with test audience germs. If a strong director took hold of King's original story and incorporated what worked from the first attempt, this could have been quite an effective little film.

It didn't and it's not, but that's not to say Children of the Corn '09 is a total failure. For starters, age appropriate actors make for strikingly disturbing extras, although their thespian skills are sadly nonexistent. Having the central couple be in disarray is interesting in itself, but it feels like both actors are still in the improv session of rehearsal, arguing and baiting each other just to feel one another out rather than having a realistic disagreement. The religious angle is probably the best thing going for Children of the Corn. Part of the reason I think some of the sequels succeeded was that they had the freedom to find different aspects of what's so terrifying about this premise. Blind faith is frightening, plain and simple. When such strong feelings are placed in the bodies of prepubescent youths who don't necessarily understand what life is yet, the result can be horrifying.

Why couldn’t this just be Gatlin’s story? Yes, we needed Burt and Vicky as a way into a closed society, but as soon as they enter, we want nothing more than to witness their end. Compare this with a similar themed, much better executed film, Who Can Kill a Child? The leads are also less interesting than the evil children running amok, but we still care enough about them to fear for their lives. In Children of the Corn, every minute of Vicky & Burt's screen time is painful in a punch-your-wife kind of way. The children, though lacking acting talent, are intriguing in their youth and eeriness. We get glimpses of how their religion works and are actually moved by some sudden new directions in the final scene, but the disjointed narrative doesn’t really let the audience care one way or another.

High Points

Casting such young actors adds a disturbing spin to the group children scenes

While the score leaves a lot to be desired (namely subtlety), there is a nice early reference to the haunting choral soprano theme so powerful in the original

The first mass attack on Vicky is done quite well, which is quite a feat considering how much we want to see the character die

Little touches, like quick shots showing corpses used in place of department store mannequins, add a nice touch of evil to Gatlin

Low Points

\The younger actors clearly have no idea what their dialogue means, which is fine for their psyches but not so much for cinematic effect

I haven’t wanted to kill a protagonist this much since Jar Jar Binks

Just as I was thinking that the Vietnam vet angle had its merits, the film had to get all literal and give us a reenactment flashback in the middle of corn

When will filmmakers learn: synthesized demon voices do not sound sound scary, just stupid

Lessons Learned

Indian corn crafts are blasphemous to Californians

Raise your children to love religion and hate the world

Unhappy couples make for incredibly unhappy viewing

When walking by a homicidal mob, it’s best not to audibly call them little bastards if you don’t want to then be chased by sickle and rake wielding brats

Previous Theory Confirmed

If Revenge of the Sith has taught us anything, it's that no actor--even the disembodied voice of James Earl Jones--is capable of pulling of the "Nooooo!" scene in this day and age

Winning Line

"Put that in your God and smoke it." 

Can someone explain to me how one does this?

Rent/Bury/Buy

Just because a film is close to its source material does not mean that it's any good. That being said, this remake/adaptation (because really, it's not remaking the 1984 film, just re-adapting King's story) is not terrible and probably falls somewhere in the middle of the many entries in this series. There are some strong moments and the actual religious kid angle is done quite well. Its biggest fault is a pair of horrifically unsympathetic protagonists and a lack of focus for our characters. Fans of the series or rural/killer child horror should give it a rent (or TiVo it on SyFy...ugh I hate writing those four letters), but there's nothing revolutionary here. I'll keep watching more sequels and hope a better one comes along.

But hey, I'm just one opinionated corn consumer in this vast universe. So how about checking out some other takes on this version via the one and only Final Girl Film Club? Head on over for what's always a good time, thanks to bloggess extraordinaire Stacie Ponder and all the other industrious club kids with a free 90 minutes to spare on THE WORST MARRIAGE IN CINEMA HISTORY. 

Sorry. I'm still twitching from the amount of bickering these characters wrought. Point is, FILM CLUB!