Stephen King’s The Children Of The Corn
By no means the greatest book-to-film adaptation out there (it is a Stephen King rendition, after all), 1984’s The Children of the Corn still offers enough of the author’s haunting inspiration to keep everyone watching on edge.
The story follows a couple, Burt (Peter Horton) and Vicky (Linda Hamilton AKA Sarah Connor), who find themselves stuck in the agricultural town of Gatlin, Nebraska. An innocent enough looking place, the two come to realize that it’s overrun by a cult of children who kill anybody over the age of 18 as sacrifice for a demonic being. Led by the tantalizing Isaac (John Franklin), whose eyes are just about as creepy as his satanic agenda, and armed with your usual farming equipment, these kids are not to be messed with.
Is it cheesy? Yes. Is it outdated? Yes, especially when the unseen “He Who Walks Behind the Rows” enacts his fury. But there’s something about the idea of a kindergarten cult with sickles that’s alarming enough to look past the technological discrepancies.