By DR. BENNY GRAVES
Starring Elizabeth Barondes, John Mese and Stephen Root
Written by Reed Steiner and Dan Mazur
Directed by Jeff Burr
Ah, the time has come! A chill drifts through the night air. Green leaves shift to burnt orange. Basic college girls begin their migration to the nearest Starbucks. (Turns out I’m no better.) For those of us who worship at the altar of Samhain, the best time of the year begins definitively on September 1 (Sometimes earlier for you Summer-ween patriots.) If you breathe deep the carrion scents of the Analog Abattoir, you know that for us, this season is year-long, and the spirit flows in our blood. However, there are certain movies that we all reserve for this very special season, and I’d be remiss not to share one that recently entered my permanent autumn viewing roster.
Scarecrows are integral to the harvest and by extension, Halloween. Now, what if that fun emblem of the season was possessed with malevolent intent? What if those straw-stuffed hands wielded pointy farm implements with the intent of whipping up a little human hibachi? Now we’re talking! Sadly (and strangely), the canon of killer scarecrow flicks is relatively limited. Of course, there’s the beloved made-for-TV movie Dark Night of The Scarecrow, the mostly slept-on robbery-turned-murder(y) film Scarecrows and the lesser-known Dark Harvests. However, I’m not discussing those movies; I’m talking about a largely uncelebrated horror epic that The Rewind Zone’s Yasmina Ketita recommended to me. There we were at the Buffalo Horror Garage Sale, when my eyes fell upon a VHS cover featuring the image of an eerie straw figure crucified and clutching a scythe in one hand. “It’s a good one!” Yasmina exclaimed. Now, I’m nothing if not a careful buyer… So, I immediately purchased it. Boy, was my lack of self-control rewarded! NIGHT OF THE SCARECROW, directed by the late Jeff Burr (From a Whisper to a Scream, Leatherface: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre III), is the Gone With The Wind of evil scarecrow movies. (I have never used hyperbole, so you’ll have to take my word for it.)
For a supernatural slasher made in the 1990s, this movie is so lean, silly and packed full of scarecrow slaughter that it legitimately shocks me that more people don’t talk about it. The setup is simple: A warlock is allowed to live and do as he pleases in a failing Colonial village, with the promise of changing its fortunes. He fulfills his promise. However, the town prudes hate his cool, sexy parties and use his sorcery to imprison him. Smash cut to “the present day,” where drunken youths (naturally) accidentally undo the magical bonds. Inhabiting the body of a scarecrow, he doles out bloody revenge on the descendants of those who betrayed him.
Our scarecrow pal’s vengeance includes equal parts black magic and hyper-violent mayhem – with some really creative setpieces. There isn’t much in the way of twists and turns, and you’ll see the end coming from a mile away. Still, the success of NIGHT OF THE SCARECROW lies more in its impressive practical effects and delightfully breakneck pacing. The relative obscurity of this movie is not really a surprise. By 1995 the pre-Scream slasher bubble had burst, but champions of gooey grue hung on by a thread. That same year, we got Tales From The Crypt: Demon Night (a personal favorite and a definite future review) and the brutal late-period Stuart Gordon classic, Castle Freak.
Sadly, the Blu-ray of NIGHT OF THE SCARECROW is currently out of print, so you’ll have to be creative to get a copy. However, once you do, plug in that IV of pumpkin spice and get cozy on the couch. Things are about to get… itchy and uncomfortable. Sorry, I was trying to do a straw-centric bit here, I’ll workshop it.
Death to False Horror,
Dr. Benny Graves
