By Geno McGahee
I love scarecrow movies. The 1988 classic “SCARECROWS,” the micro-budget hits “PSYCHO SCARECROW” and “RISE OF THE SCARECROWS” and the made for TV flick “DARK NIGHT OF THE SCARECROW,” were all enjoyable. The 2004 straight to video “DARK HARVEST” is a memorable low-budget scarecrow movie with plenty of great overacting and fun dialogue.
We begin with Sean (Don Digiulio) inheriting some land, but his dark family history comes back to haunt him. Sean’s dad killed a lot of drifters and hanged them on crosses, dressing them like scarecrows, and now they are back for revenge. Sean must pay for the sins of his father and the scarecrows are going around with weapons and glowing eyes with death on their mind.
Digiulio’s performance was outstanding. His continual screaming is awesome, especially when he looks at a picture of father and goes into a rage, yelling: “You sick twisted fuck. You sick, twisted, stupid-ass, redneck mother fucker!” He then punches the glass and growls. It was awesome.
The scarecrows look pretty good and they do some very cool things where they appear out of nowhere to kill. At one point, a scarecrow jumps out of a pile of hay to attack. There are a lot of cool shots and you can tell that the makers of this film truly loved the genre and presented a very good horror film.
It is a fight for survival and the scarecrows are taking no prisoners, but Sean is doing his best to combat this evil force and does pretty well, and I found it very amusing from start to finish.
DARK HARVEST is a fun scarecrow horror flick. If you enjoy scarecrow horror, then you should check this out. I highly recommend it.
Rating: 7/10
