Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		3.5
Audio		4.0
Extras		3.0
Overall		3.0

Scarecrows Blu-ray Movie Review

If they only had a brain. But enough about the victims.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman June 2, 2015

In his commentary accompanying this new Blu-ray as a supplement, co-writer and director William Wesley talks about the spark of an idea which ultimately resulted in Scarecrows, mentioning that part of his inspiration is that up until his 1988 film there had been no outings featuring killer scarecrows. Wesley evidently never saw 1981’s Dark Night of the Scarecrow or the even earlier 1976 entry The Town That Dreaded Sundown, a film which admittedly only featured a scarecrow- esque villain with a head swathed in burlap. Be that as it may, Scarecrows, while never able to fully escape from its more than obvious lo-fi roots, something Wesley and producer Cami Winikoff talk about repeatedly in their commentary, perhaps understandably proud that they managed to complete a film on so little money, still is often surprisingly effective. The film (perhaps due to budget constraints) wastes absolutely no time in setting up its premise. A gaggle of paramilitary crooks have made off with a huge fortune and have hijacked a private plane to make their getaway. They’re already mid-flight as the film opens, with some clunky but serviceable “broadcasts” filling the audience in on what has gone before. Soon enough it becomes clear there’s no honor among thieves, as one of the gang decides he doesn’t want to divvy up the booty. He tosses a grenade toward the front of the plane and makes a hasty exit out the door (with a parachute, of course). That of course throws the rest of the bad guys (and gal), not to mention the pilot and his daughter, into a panic, though the grenade is ultimately dealt with and the plane is set down so that the villains can find the “jumper” and take back the loot. Unfortunately for all involved where they land (in one form or another) turns out to be a bit problematic, as the titular entities shamble to life and begin hunting these so-called Crows (Wesley mentions this perhaps subliminal conceit in his commentary, stating that the characters are all dressed in black and descend from the sky, hence their “psychological” appearance to the scarecrows).

Scarecrows might seem an odd entry in eighties horror, given the decade’s prevalence of slasher films, but despite what was evidently almost an absurdly low budget, Wesley and his team (many of which were barely out of high school, as revealed in one of the supplements) manage to craft an at times spectacularly creepy outing. Once Bert (B.J. Turner) absconds with the cash, his (former) partners in crime get their hostages, pilot Al (David Campbell) and his daughter Kellie (Victoria Christian) to set the plane down so that they can pursue him and reclaim their stolen booty.

In the meantime Bert has parachuted into a seemingly abandoned farm of some kind, one which is watched over by some pretty gruesome looking scarecrows. While Roxanne (Kristina Sanborn) “babysits” Kellie at the plane, the other criminals, including Jack (Richard Vidan), Curry (Michael Simms) and Corbin (Ted Vernon) head off to track down Bert and the (re)stolen loot. Al also has a few plans of his own up his sleeve, which play out as the film progresses.

For the bulk of Scarecrows’ rather brief running time, Wesley does a rather astoundingly good job of building suspense. The mercenary thieves are armed to the teeth and have night vision goggles (virtually the entire film plays out overnight), something which would seem to make them invulnerable. Well, not even high power assault rifles and other high tech gear turns out to be enough to keep several (as in several) of the culprits from falling prey to the titular entities.

Perhaps due to that shoestring (aglet?) budget, Wesley doesn’t dwell on the marauding scarecrows until the final act of the film. Up until that point, there are a couple of nicely gruesome kill scenes that at least “introduce” the monsters of the film without ever revealing too much. That means that relatively huge swaths of the film are left for dialogue scenes, when what might have propelled the film into true classic status is more action, less talk.

What works, and works quite well indeed, is the increasing sense of paranoia and dysfunction between the former comrades as the film progresses, as well as Al’s trek to the “dark side.” Some of the dialogue is silly, and the actors struggle at times to invest their roles with a modicum of believability. Special makeup effects work from Norman Cabrera (who was still a teenager when he worked on the film) invests the scarecrows with an unforgettably menacing mien, one which helps elevate some of the more cliché ridden aspects of the rest of the film.

Scarecrows Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Scarecrows is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Scream Factory, an imprint of Shout! Factory, with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.85:1. Legendary cinematographer Dean Cundey is sometimes referred to as the "prince of darkness" of contemporary cinematographers due to some of his shadow swathed collaborations with John Carpenter (oddly not including Prince of Darkness), but Scarecrows' DP Peter Deming, who has gone on to a rather illustrious career (The Cabin in the Woods, Oz the Great and Powerful 3D) might give Cundey a run for his money, at least as evidenced by the looming gloom running rampant throughout this film. Deming had only worked previously on Hollywood Shuffle prior to coming on board with Scarecrows, and so it's rather remarkable how facile his lighting is in what must have been rather difficult conditions. This is all to say that Scarecrows is often very dark, with a negligible amount of shadow detail and on several occasions outright crush where little other than faces manage to permeate the murk. Things aren't helped especially by the POV "night vision" sequences, all of them bathed in a sickly green which more or less eradicates fine detail (see screenshot 3). Grain is quite pronounced throughout this transfer, spiking appreciably in the darkest scenes, and unfortunately giving rise to some minor but noticeable compression artifacts. Elements are actually in surprisingly good shape, however, with very little in the way of even dust to mention. Culled from the MGM catalog, this has the look of an older master, but that said, bitrates are generally very high (quite often in the mid-30s or above). With an understanding of the lo-fi filming conditions and the fact that almost all of this film plays out in extremely dark environments, this high definition presentation, while not perfect, is quite good and should please the film's fans.

Scarecrows Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Scarecrows features both DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 and DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 options, and both provide excellent listening experiences. The 5.1 track significantly opens up the excellent score by Terry Plumeri (why doesn't this guy have more major credits?) while also placing sound effects in discrete channels. Dialogue is well supported and generally well prioritized, though the 2.0 iteration tends to offer it a bit more forward at times. Fidelity is excellent and dynamic range very wide in these problem free tracks.

Scarecrows Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• The Last Straw with Norman Cabrera (1080p; 16:35) is a typically well done Red Shirt Pictures/Scream supplement featuring effects specialist Cabrera, who reminisces about the production. He was only 18 at the time, part of a very young crew.


• Cornfield Commando with Ted Vernon (1080p; 8:46) does similar duty for co-star Vernon.


• Original Storyboards (1080p; 3:48)


• Still Gallery (1080p; 5:12)


• Theatrical Trailer (1080p; 1:32)


• Audio Commentary with Director William Wesley and Producer Cami Winikoff. Nicely conversational but also filled with great detail, this is a nice listen, though a bit self-congratulatory at times (the two seem amazed that they pulled off this film on so little moolah).


• Audio Commentary with Co-Screenwriter Richard Jefferies, DP Peter Deming and Composer Terry Plumeri. Michael Felsher "hosts" three separately recorded interviews which appear one after the other. All three are quite interesting, though I personally found the Deming and Plumeri segments the most captivating.

Scarecrows Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Scarecrows is a surprisingly effective low budget horror outing, and it might have been a major box office blockbuster had it been graced with a top tier action star headlining the cast. William Wesley overcomes the deficits of a paltry budget with at times rather amazing finesse. The film tends to lose a bit of momentum as it goes along (strangely just when the scarecrows become most "animated"), but there's a palpably spooky ambience in this film that makes it rather chilling. Technical merits are very good (video) to excellent (audio), and once again Scream has assembled a nice supplementary package. Recommended.