Against the odds, this horror series (initially based on a Stephen King short story) has actually improved over time to the point where this third installment is a creditable if far-fetched chiller.
After their father's death, teenaged brothers Eli (Daniel Cerny) and Joshua (Ron Melendez) travel from their small farming hometown to Chicago to stay with foster parents William and Alice Porter (Jim Metzler and Nancy Lee Grahn). What only Eli knows is that their dad was killed by an evil
cornfield spirit called "He Who Walks Behind the Rows," which Eli worships. The boy has brought some tainted corn with him, and secretly plants it in an abandoned lot and warehouse near his new home. While Joshua adjusts to his new life and finds a girlfriend, Maria (Mari Morrow), Eli begins
recruiting their classmates to his cult, and anyone who crosses him or his corn meets a horrible fate.
William discovers Eli's cornfield and, realizing the financial potential of this especially hardy strain, proceeds with plans to market it and reap the financial rewards. Meanwhile, Joshua has become suspicious of Eli, travels back to their hometown, and discovers the supernatural truth. He races
home as Eli is gathering his teenaged followers at the warehouse--where "He Who Walks Behind the Rows" erupts from the floor as a huge, hideous monster. Joshua arrives just in time to rescue Maria, and puts a stop to the creature and its demonic influence.
After the laughable 1984 original and the slightly improved but muddled 1993 sequel, CHILDREN OF THE CORN III proves a pleasant surprise (and, ironically, is the first of the series to go direct to video). While hardly groundbreaking and resolutely an exploitation film, it's put together
confidently and is certainly more entertaining than, for example, the same year's "official" King film, THE MANGLER. The script works some entertaining urban variations on the previously rural-set story, with William's attempts to financially exploit Eli's crop of super-corn a nice touch. Director
James Hickox--brother of HELLRAISER III director Anthony, who served as this movie's executive producer--keeps the film moving swiftly past its implausibilities and holds at bay the feeling that its existence is rather gratuitous in the first place.
The actors are generally decent, with Cerny (who also played a nasty kid in DEMONIC TOYS) possessing a creepy presence as the instigator of the mayhem. The special effects vary wildly; the opening death-by-corn is especially strong, but when "He Who Walks Behind the Rows" makes his grand
appearance at the end, he proves to be a combination of effective full-size props, grainy opticals and some unconvincing miniatures. On balance, CHILDREN OF THE CORN III is a superior example of the video-sequel trend; inevitably, a CHILDREN OF THE CORN IV was already in the can by the end of
1995. (Graphic violence, profanity.) leave a comment
