Impression of the flicks I got for Christmas (Scarecrows, Class of 1984,1999)

[daveblackeye15]

For the record to me Bad/B-movies to me roughly means 'non-main stream films), and sci-fi/horror often fall into that category. So none of these three fell into the 'this is so bad its horrible and hurts' section.

*spoilers to all three*
Scarecrows: Not bad at all really. Five AWOL soldiers take off with a bunch of money and take two hostages and end up at a haunted farm in the south. This movie has some pretty creepy moments but what puts it above average is that I catch some nice little details that really add up. For one thing the AWOL soldiers are not the complete monsters I was expecting. Four of them seem to be friends, and some act pretty nice to the hostages, its a nice touch that gives a bit more complex to the fodder. Another thing I liked is that whenever they showed the plane, roughly outside the turf of the farm, it seems like they intentional matted the background to make it look like a different time that where the characters are inside the field. Giving the impression that the victims have fallen into some kind of sub-dimension while time passes on the outside. Or it could just be poor special effects but it seemed intentional. But what the hell was the point of that damn dog!?

Class of 1984: The director apparently thought that two years from when he made this that school was going to get so bad teachers would start packing heat. Maybe he was partially right but where I've grown up we certainly don't have metal detectors, despite the Thurston shooting. If not for some pretty solid directing I think we'd have an average 'revenge' flick here. But Peter Stegman became such a believable and scary villain that it feels good to see him get his, along with the rest of the gang, violent death. I especially liked Roddy McDowall as an alcoholic and depressed teacher that befriends the protagonist. A spot of weakness is the wife of Norris who is hardly her own character and merely a motivation to help get Norris violent in the end. Certainly happy to see this after all these years. And then it gets kind of weird with the semi-sequel.

Class of 1999: If class of 1984 is a scholar warning about 'this country we look down on now, will be in top league in a few decades' then 1999 is when that scholar begins to say 'and its because they are being visited by aliens that will give them laser guns and monsters'. I think Lester here was doing this as less of a social commentary and more of an entertaining flick. I hope. It is interesting to note that this time the roles are reversed, its the gangs we end up rooting for and it is the teachers (albeit bloodthirsty cyborgs) we're against. I especially liked the two male cyborg teachers, one a pipe-smoking professor type, the other a dorky gym teacher, the third is really more like a pretty face. The effects are quite nice what with the cyborgs ripping off their arms to reveal their more destructive limbs. Again if not for Lester's directing keeping this pretty solid I think this would have been forgettable. And odd sequel but entertaining none the less if you look at it as more of a spin-off. Then we got Class of 1999 part II: the Substitute which more or less seems to ignore the first movie. So its kind of like if we called Return of the Jedi "The Empire Strikes Back part II: The Return of the Jedi". (Okay not perfect but I think you get what I mean).

Pretty nice hull of movies, all three I've been curious to see for years.

[Skull]

I love Scarecrows (1988)... I seen the movie around 1988 (or 89) and made similar "Scarecrows" stand-ins for Halloween in 89... sadlly they got stolen within a few days :(