Title: Husk
Directed by: Brett Simmons
Starring: Devon Graye, Wes Chatham and C.J. Thomason
Running time: 83 minutes – Rated R
A group of friends traveling on a private road near a massive cornfield get forced off the road by a murder of suicidal crows. They look for help at the only farmhouse in the area where they discover some supernatural force had caused them to be there.
There are several things that made this movie a bit of a cliché: One of the character’s names is Johnny, an emotionally disturbed girl, a jock, a guy who can’t see without his glasses and an angst-y emo; add all those to an abandoned farmhouse in the middle of a cornfield and the script just writes itself.
The film reminded me somewhat of Jeepers Creepers which I absolutely loathed, but the nerdy Scott (Devon Graye; you may know him as teenage Dexter of the much beloved Showtime series) made me want to continue watching. You think he’s going to get picked off first, but it was a nice little twist to keep his character going. I did not like the couple Brian and Natalie; the fact that they used the word “baby” after every sentence made me only anticipate their deaths.
If anyone watches horror movies where the story takes place in a cornfield, what you never do is go towards the farmhouse. Natalie (Tammin Sursok of Pretty Little Liars) makes a comment about running 4 miles to the nearest gas station. Four miles or imminent bloody death, do you take the chance? Of course if they did that, there would be no animated corpses sewing scarecrow hoods in an upstairs room of the abandoned farmhouse with rusty nails through their fingertips.
The script was decent, regardless of cliché plot. The cinematography and the special effects were good. It wasn’t so much scary as it was suspenseful. You knew when someone was going to die, but it was maybe two beats after what you were expecting; which to me is good horror filmmaking. Keep the audience on edge, but make sure there’s an eventual payoff where it is supposed to be. I also liked that there wasn’t buckets o’ blood. You can make a decent horror movie without making it too goopy. The ghostly flashbacks were a bit trite, but I could see it was necessary for the pacing of the film.
The ending is left open for possible sequels, but I can’t see that happening. There’s only so many ways you can get brutalized by a scarecrow. I expect more out of Simmons, he can do better than a sequel.
Gore factor: 3 out of 5
Story: 3 out of 5
Suspense: 3 out of 5
Acting: 3 out of 5
Overall Rating: 3 out of 5
Reviewed by: JM Willis
