Back to Gatlin

 When watching Children of the Corn (1984), I pretty much feel the same as I have in recent viewings. I disagree with this film's ardent critics who have nothing good to say about it. I think that opening scene in the diner is a serious wallop. Seeing kids, led by a demonic looking Courtney Gains (who is a key piece of good casting), just massacre adults in that diner, pulling out those farming implements to brutalize them, is unforgettable, in my opinion. I think that was needed to truly understand just how much of a spell those kids were under. That image of Issac (John Franklin) looking into the window, orchestrating that massacre, is powerful. That is just fucking evil, man. The backstory involving how Isaac and He Who Walks Behind the Rows "hooked up", with the gradual influence on all the kids (except for Job and Sarah), happened away from the audience, so there does seem to be quite a bit we never are privy to. But the married couple, Burt (Peter Horton) and Vicky (Linda Hamilton), seemingly willed or fated to Gatlin without their actual say-so, unable to go straight to a different Nebraska town is one of those mystical detours that I'm iffy on. But the ghost town with the kids sneaking about as Burt and Vicky arrive, looking for law enforcement or a phone to call some cop or department, is really damn eerie to me. I would not want to wind up there all alone if I'm an adult. The film does allow Burt and Vicky to survive longer than most adults would, but Malachi (Gains) with that long knife around is planted in our minds...he could send his army of brats with sickles and hooks (with handles) at any point and time. The nearly abandoned town, where kids always seem to be hiding, is such a horror gem...I never tire of that kind of setting. The Sarah clairvoyance with her art depicting future events doesn't quite work for me personally. The power struggle between Issac and Malachi is obvious right from the jump. But the bickering couple part of King's story isn't quite emphasized in this film adaptation...their squabbles are due to situations they face outside their control (a kid in the middle of the road with his throat slashed, and the inexplicable detour neither desires), not because of marital problems before arriving to Gatlin. 

The emphasis on weapons is a visual decision the director pointedly uses a lot. It would seem those kids always have their sickles, hooks, and knives on them just in case some adult wanders on the premises or property. These kids seem ready, willing, and able to kill at a moment's notice. That might be the scariest part of the film. That ongoing threat. And the cornfields are an aesthetic the director gets a lot out of. And the rural landscape seems like the perfect killing ground for kids with knives. So to just easily dismiss the film as garbage, I can't do that.