Children of the Corn III: Urban Harvest

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Children of the Corn III: Urban Harvest
Promotional poster
Directed byJames D. R. Hickox
Written byDode B. Levenson
Based onChildren of the Corn
by Stephen King
Produced byGary Depew
Brad Southwick
StarringDaniel Cerny
Ron Melendez
Michael Ensign
Jon Clair
CinematographyGerry Lively
Edited byChris Peppe
Music byDaniel Licht
Production
company
Park Avenue Productions
Distributed byDimension Films
Miramax Films
Release date
  • September 12, 1995 (1995-09-12)
Running time
92 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish

Children of the Corn III: Urban Harvest is a 1995 American supernatural slasher film directed by James D. R. Hickox, and starring Daniel Cerny, Jim Metzler, Nancy Grahn, and Mari Morrow. It is the third film in the Children of the Corn series, and focuses on two mysterious brothers who are adopted from rural Nebraska and brought to Chicago as a chain of deadly occurrences surrounding the family follows, involving a cult in which the younger brother is a follower.[1] Children of the Corn III marked the film debuts of Nicholas Brendon, Ivana Miličević, and Charlize Theron. Ed Grady reprises his role as Dr. Richard Appleby from the first sequel via a flashback sequence to Children of the Corn II: The Final Sacrifice.

The film was followed by an unrelated sequel, titled Children of the Corn IV: The Gathering (1996).

Plot[edit]

Eli and Joshua are being taken into foster care with William and Amanda Porter of Chicago after the death of their father, who was killed by Eli. The two boys do not mix well with a home in modern Chicago; their formal, Amish-like clothes from Gatlin, Eli's fire-and-brimstone prayer at dinner, and them bringing a suitcase full of corn to Chicago strike their new parents and neighbors as unusual. On his first night in Chicago, after everyone else has gone to sleep, Eli quietly leaves the Porters', taking his corn-filled suitcase, and heads to an empty factory on the other side of the backyard fence. There he prays to "He Who Walks Behind the Rows" and plants corn seeds on the factory grounds; rows of corn appear almost instantly.

The next day the boys start school, and Eli nearly gets into a fight with T-Loc, a student in Joshua's grade, and harshly criticizes Joshua for playing basketball with some of the other students. Disgusted with their classmates' modern lifestyle, Eli decides to bring "He Who Walks Behind the Rows" to Chicago, and a homeless man who finds the cornfield is murdered. Joshua makes friends with neighbors Maria and Malcolm and spends less time with Eli.

The social worker who brought Eli and Joshua to the Porters' discovers that Eli was originally adopted from Gatlin, Nebraska (the town from the first film), and that he has not aged since 1964. She tries to warn the Porters, but Eli quickly burns her alive for knowing too much. Amanda notices Eli's strange mannerisms, and when she tries to cut down his cornfield it attacks her. She attempts to escape, but she trips on a pole and her head is impaled on a broken pipe, killing her instantly. William finds the cornfield Eli has planted and realizes that with its seemingly-perfect natural invulnerability to disease, ability to grow out-of-season and in the worst of soil, it could be a highly-marketable product. Despite his wife's death, which Eli arranged, William finds backers and looks forward to the massive profits Eli's strain of corn will bring.

Eli neglects to inform his foster father of another property the corn possesses: it turns children who eat it into followers of He Who Walks Behind the Rows. Eli decisively sways his high-school classmates towards his beliefs, turning them against the principal and directing them to abandon basketball and other previously typical activities. Alarmed at Eli's converting of the students, the principal attempts to inform other staff, but they don't believe him, as Eli's efforts have actually restored order at the school to a degree few had thought possible.

By the time Joshua realizes the full truth, Eli has killed their foster parents, the school principal, and Malcolm and Maria's parents, and he now has full control of his fellow students. Joshua confronts him, revealing that he has gone back to Gatlin (which resulted in Malcolm's death) and found the Bible of He Who Walks Behind the Rows which Eli holds sacred and, together with his own body, can survive indefinitely if one is intact. Eli roars "Give me the book!" and charges. Joshua throws it down, and as Eli scrambles to pick it up, Joshua stabs Eli and the book with a sickle, destroying both.

After Eli dies, He Who Walks Behind the Rows rises from the cornfield in the form of a grotesque monster with several tentacles. It kills several of Eli's followers who have slipped from his control in horrific ways, including T-Loc. After a brief struggle, Joshua repeatedly stabs the sickle at the monster's lower body, which resembles a large tree root sticking out of the ground. He Who Walks Behind the Rows collapses and seems to die.

As the film closes, the first shipment of Eli's corn arrives in Germany, the beginning of shipments all over the world.

Cast[edit]

Production[edit]

Principal photography began in December 1993 and ended on January 15, 1994.[2] The special effects for the film were supervised by Kevin Yagher.[3]

Release[edit]

Home media[edit]

Children of the Corn III: Urban Harvest was the first film in the series made under Dimension Films and Miramax Films, who purchased the rights to the series and distributed the seven sequels to the original two films. It was also the first film in the series to be released direct-to-video, arriving at U.S. video stores on September 12, 1995, on VHS and DVD.

The film debuted on Blu-ray on May 10, 2011, via Echo Bridge Entertainment.[4]

Reception[edit]

J.R. Taylor of Entertainment Weekly gave the film a B-rating: "This latest installment — the best of the Stephen King-derived series — offers some unexpected plot developments and surprisingly chilling gore. But fear not, it's unlikely Urban Harvest will cause nightmares, due to its hilariously inept climax. When the humongous corn creature shakes a screaming girl in its goo paws, the victim looks suspiciously like a Barbie doll".[5] TV Guide awarded the film two out of five stars, praising the performances, and adding: "Against the odds, this horror series (initially based on a Stephen King short story) has actually improved over time to the point where this third installment is a creditable if far-fetched chiller".[6]

See also[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ^ Browning, Mark (2011). Stephen King on the Small Screen. Intellect Ltd. pp. 65–67. ISBN 978-1841504124.
  2. ^ '"Children of the Corn III Notes". tcm.com. Retrieved 2023-08-06.
  3. ^ Stokes, Phil; Stokes, Sarah (2022). Clive Barker's Dark Worlds. Cernunnos. ISBN 978-1419758461.
  4. ^ "Children of the Corn III: Urban Harvest Blu-ray".
  5. ^ Taylor, J.R. (September 12, 1995). "Video Review: 'Children of the Corn III: Urban Harvest'". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved April 4, 2018.
  6. ^ "Children of the Corn III: Urban Harvest". TV Guide. Retrieved April 4, 2018.

External links[edit]

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