4 gibbles out of 5

Director: Fritz Kiersch

Children of the Corn is certainly one of those classic 80s horror films, yet, for some reason, I find that it’s generally classified below those ago-old Freddie and Jason standards. While it lacks the posterboy murderer of those films, I felt that this was actually a more solid movie than many of the other horror hallmarks.

Children of the Corn is a children-gone-wrong kind of film. It doesn’t hide this fact, opening up with a scene where kids go crazy and kill adults. (Offscreen, but there’s plenty of reaction with blood-splatter type shots) We then jump to a couple traveling by car from somewhere to somewhere who end up getting stuck in the kid-run town. What was impressive to me was that the film avoided much cheapness that is typical of the genre: stupid protagonists, opportunities for escape that are bypassed. While there are some times where it seemed better to leave than to go, for the most part, the plight of the couple and their responses to what’s going on are believable.

And while it might seem cheap, the idea to cast a 25-year old w/ growth hormone deficiency as the leader of the kids was beneficial, giving their spokesman an edge that an appropriately aged actor might not have had. This was slightly above three-star fare, but what prompted the four stars were four things: -the children were written respectably and intelligently. -the bruises and scrapes remain consistent, and when the male lead injures his arm, he doesn’t start using it 30 minutes later in the film. -the male lead hits his head on a wooden pole for no reason and falls down a lot. -the totally sensible timing and silence of the “THE END” credit.