Memorable, crazy movie

Pretty good movie overall. First half was nothing special but it got better as it went along.

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

This is an almost good horror flick: with good cinematography, good actors (Lacey Chabert is quite good throughout) and a well-done CGI Scarecrow.The problem is the plot.First, the movie doesn't properly setup the history of the monster and it doesn't setup the initial monster-meet on Kristen's (Lacey Chabert) old family farm. As mentioned by others, why is there corn growing on a supposedly abandoned farm? But these errors could be forgiven if the rest of the plot held up. It doesn't.In the first half of the movie, various teens do stupid things (wander off alone) and promptly get killed, fair enough - that's the standard trope for this type of movie. In the second half of the movie, the remaining teens, adults do smart things (run fast and far together) and promptly get killed, which is ridiculous.It's a shame because there's a decent horror movie in there somewhere, just needed a script rewrite or two.

School teacher Aaron Harris (Dunne) is in charge of detention, so he sentences his group of six high school students to clean up a friend's (Chabert) family farm which has a urban legend attached to it. A massacre at the farm years earlier has it haunted by an evil spirit which takes up residence in the field's scarecrow. Before you can pick an ear of corn this digital scarecrow is attacking our hapless group and killing them off in the farm and the adjoining cornfield. This Syfy movie starts off decently enough and then crumbles under lousy digital effects and a script that doesn't have much to offer. Rick Suvalle's script is light on character development so we don't really get to know any of them so when they're in danger we are disconnected as an audience. Even the back-story of the legend of the farm and the origin of the killer scarecrow are left without explanation. The production value is fine but the CGI scarecrow just doesn't supply any chills to speak of. A few practical effects and a decent amount of bloodshed help a little bit, but in the end it's a pretty lifeless entry into the killer Scarecrow sub-genre.

1.9 of 10. For a film that originates on a channel called "SyFy", there's not even science fiction in this massively dumb story. The characters and acting don't help.Some "horror" films at least provide some soft-core sex to fill in gaps, but no luck in this PG horror for kiddies nonsense. I can only imagine children who still take the Grinch, Santa, and ghosts of Christmas past seriously could enjoy a Halloween story so flimsy.There are some good copycat video and audio FX in this. Hopefully the people responsible for them will be put to better use with more competent writers, directors, and actors.

While Scarecrow is left wanting somewhat, for SyFy it really isn't so bad. There are some good things. Scarecrow is one of SyFy's better-looking recent movies, the scenery is good and atmosphere and it is slickly shot. The quality of the scarecrow design is not bad at all, in fact apart from some too-smooth movements, which for SyFy is saying a good deal. The score does have some eeriness, and the beginning sets things up nicely. The acting is better than average also, Lacey Chabert and Robin Dunne fare the best and they are good. The direction is of the kind is that is never inept or adept, competent is the best word though it could have been with more crispness and character in the latter part of the movie. There are failings in Scarecrow though. The biggest failing is that it doesn't convey its horror elements very well. There are some moments in the first half, but much of it suffers from being too been-there-done-that quality, from not knowing when to end, from having a lack of build-up or suspense and that the fear and danger levels are quite low. The story is refreshingly simple to begin with and starts promisingly, sadly it is also the kind of story that later on becomes too simple and runs out of ideas too early. There is also too much down-time and exposition, coupled with the lack of scares there are too many of tediousness. The dialogue could have done with being tighter, and with less of an over-serious and simplistic approach. The exposition scenes are particularly bad in this regard. And while the scarecrow is good in look, it also doesn't have much of a personality and is severely under-utilised. In conclusion, not bad, could have been worse but it's nothing particularly great either. 5/10 Bethany Cox