Scott LeBrun The second (small) screen version of Stephen Kings' short story stars David Anders and Kandyse McClure as the couple Burt and Vicky Stanton. Burt & Vicky, whose relationship has turned utterly venomous, are travelling cross country. On their way through Nebraska, they run down a child in the road - only for Burt to realize that the kid was basically dead before they hit him; his throat was slashed. Making it to the nearby tiny town of Gatlin, they are soon confronting the towns' children, who have turned murderous and now pray to a different sort of God named "He Who Walks Behind the Rows".This version is scripted by King himself and director Donald P. Borchers, who'd produced the 1984 feature film. Unlike the original, "Children of the Corn" '09 is scrupulously faithful to the story. (Not that being faithful is always necessarily a good thing.) Burt and Vicky are NOT getting along to begin with, so their current situation only makes things worse. Problem with this is that you'll probably find it hard to care about this idiot couple. He comes off slightly better, but only because he's more low key and isn't nearly as insufferable as she is. He's still a stubborn dummy, of course, and their inability to get the Hell out of Dodge before the excrement hits the fan merely serves to seal their fate.One new wrinkle this time is to make Burt & Vicky an inter-racial couple, not that it actually adds anything to the story. That element is just sort of there. The King / Borchers teleplay also goes awfully heavy on the 'Nam parallels, making Burt a veteran who ends up flashing back to his time in the service. There's also some good old fashioned sex to spice things up a little.The original film may have been laughable, and ultimately cheesy, but at least it had more personality, and was more entertaining, than this. It's not good when you can't bring yourself to root for the protagonists. Anders and McClure do whatever they're capable of with these roles, but they're easily outshone by Daniel Newman, as Malachai, and Preston Bailey, as the intense boy preacher Issac. Still, these two kids aren't going to stick in your memory the way that Courtney Gains and John Franklin do.One worthy component is the music by Jonathan Elias (who scored the '84 film) and Nathaniel Morgan. Robert Kurtzman supplies the decent enough gore.This viewer didn't hate this adaptation nearly as much as some people, but will concede that the '84 film shows people a generally better time, despite its utterly goofy, upbeat ending.If you stick it out to the bitter end, there IS a final scene following the end credits.Six out of 10.

GL84 On a road trip through rural Nebraska, a divorcing couple find an abandoned town to be the home of a cult of children worshiping a bizarre figure that lives in their cornfields and must find a way of stopping the kids from turning them into their next sacrifice.This is a pretty troubling if somewhat watchable effort. One of the better things this gets right is the rather creepy amount of stalking and chasing around the town which helps this one along. The opening attack with the slit-throat recreation of the original as it leads into the encounter with the kids in front of the church is one of the better scenes as the scenes of them being along and feeling watched also gives this one some rather appealing suspenseful nods here and there. There's several other rather intriguing action scenes from the numerous times of the group of kids chasing after the two through town which is a lot of fun by getting some rather fun chasing here that's all the more fun by feature a large amount of suspense and action together. This is repeated in the finale with everyone along in the cornrows with all the supernaturally-powered vines which leads into the sacrifice at the end which really works well and amounts to all that's positive. The flaws, though, are more detrimental in their quality than quantity since there's not much but it does have very damaging ones mostly centered on the couple in the beginning. They're constant arguing over everything gets old quickly, as the physical and verbal abuse of them arguing over everything really strains credibility that these are supposedly the heroes. This is certainly not heroic behavior and to do it is really troubling by making the leads so irritating and annoying when we get introduced to them. Another big point here is the rather maddening and delusional religious banter throughout here, which are so hackneyed and moronic that it's not only impossible to take seriously but also rather curious as for why anyone would join up with their crusade which is a major testament to the grand amount of nonsense uttered here. The other it of contention is the point of including the flashback to Vietnam which is plain confusing and doesn't accomplish anything, though this isn't as bad as the other flaws. Overall, these are the ones that lower this version.Rated R: Graphic Violence, Language, Brief Nudity, a sex scene and continuous threatening situations toward children.

Paul Andrews Children of the Corn is set in 1975 & starts as Vietnam vet Burt Stanton (David Anders) & his wife Vicky (Kandyse McClure) drive across Nebraska, Burt decides to leave the highway & take the scenic route which leads to an argument between himself & Vicky. While not paying attention to the road Burt runs a young boy down, when Burt looks at the boy's body he notice's that his throat had been cut & it was only a matter of time before he had died anyway. The couple decide to drive to a town called Gatlin, the nearest town for miles in any direction. Once there Burt & Vicky find it completely abandoned & like it has been deserted since the early 60's, then while looking around Vicky is kidnapped by a group of children who have killed all the adults & sacrifice anyone older than nineteen to their God who they worship who they call He Who Walks Behind the Rows. Burt discovers this & attempts to find & save Vicky as well as himself from the children who insist on a blood sacrifice to He Who Walks Behind the Rows...Written, produced & directed by Donald P. Borchers this made for television remake of a short story by Stephen King has been panned by pretty much everyone but I have to say I quite liked it, sure it's no masterpiece but I found it watchable enough. Originally a short story written by Stephen King in 1977 that featured in his anthology Night Shift (which is a fine read by the way) Children of the Corn was first adapted to the silver screen in 1984 in a version that many seem to dislike although I am again of the opposite opinion & really like it before numerous sequels came out starting with Children of the Corn II: The Final Scarifice (1992) & Children of the Corn: Genesis (2011) being the latest installment while this was made somewhere between them. The original short story by King was only fifteen pages long & this sticks to it closely, in fact it's far more faithful than the 1984 version. I liked the first hour a lot, the build-up & when everything is still a mystery but once the children feature more regularly & the script tries to flesh them out & give them reasons for what they do it falls apart a little. None of it is particularly convincing & it's hard to believe that children could kill every adult in town & no-one ever finds out. What about supplies? The electric company? Friends & relatives of the adult's? At just under 90 minutes it moves along at a good pace & has some nice moments although the constant bickering between Burt & Vicky gets annoying, the constant arguments & insults make both character's quite unlikable & while you can tolerate them for fifteen pages of a story it's more difficult to sit through over an hour of them sniping at each other & moaning. The script stays focused on the story & doesn't get sidetracked with subplots & the story builds quite nicely before we get an ending that is more downbeat & faithful to the short story even though it's not an audience pleaser.The film takes place entirely in the small town & the outer corn fields of the 70's, the period explains the lack of technology & mobile phone's I suppose. There's some gore in it, a Pig is cut open, there's a slit throat throat, some blood splatter, a few dead bodies & someone gets a compound fracture of his arm. The children themselves are all dressed in black and white clothes like Amish, the one little kid Isacc has this huge hat on which looks a bit daft & some of the kid's are just too cute looking & not menacing enough. There's a little bit of sex & nudity as well but nothing too explicit.With a supposed budget of about $2,000,000 this looks a lot better than the usual SyFy Channel film & I suspect they didn't make it & only brought the rights to show it after it was finished, filmed in Iowa. The acting is alright, the two leads do what's asked of them even if their character's are unlikable.Children of the Corn is a good story & I have to say that I like both the original 1984 adaptation & this 2009 version although I prefer the former, this isn't that bad at all actually & thought it was perfectly watchable & even quite effective at times although maybe it doesn't satisfy completely.

djderka Basic plot: the very vivacious Vicky(Kandyse McClure)is sadly married to a dork "Marine" Burton (David Anders), he who acts like he barely passed Cub Scouts, travel to a small town in Nebraska and encounter biblical bigots hiding in the cornfields.I can't believe there aren't more movie with Kandyse in them. What happened? She is really cool...They find a body in the road and try and get him to "authorities". But bull headed Burton of course does everything his way despite the warnings to the contrary by Vicky.They get stuck in an abandoned town and in the worst case of oblivious ever on film, Vicky is tormented in her car, while Burton reads some old log books. Look up oblivious - it says see Burton in Children of the Corn. Oh, I forgot he is the only Marine totally oblivious of his surroundings. As I said...Cub Scout. He even fails to notice a bible thumper behind him with a sledge hammer while in an alley.So best line in the movie is when Burton finally comes out and says whoa! what are you doing to my babe. Little Issac (who should have been bitch slapped eons ago), says she is to be sacrificed. So this young, "tough" Marine says, "Just wait till I tell authorities". Could he be more of a weenie roaster?After 45 minutes of him on the run and thrashing about the cornfields, he finally finds Vicky.A message to Donald Borchers who wrote the movie...He who writes terrible scripts shall suffer condemnation and smitten by an inability to write and/or direct such movies...so saith the lord. And ye shall be banished among the bluemen. Amen.This movie is only worth viewing as long as Kandyse is on the screen, she is beautiful, has screen presence and can act, unlike everyone else in the movie. He who watches movies with beautiful girls shall watch many of them. Turn off the film as soon as she disappears after the car trashing scene. You are done with the movie.This could have been a great short. The couple is traveling down the road...he sees the body. They argue, he gets out of the car to enter the cornfield. She drives away leaving his ass behind. The End.