Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2019
Images from the Internet
Scarecrow County
Directed by John Oak Dalton
Midwest Film Venture
75 minutes, 2019
I firmly believe that
one day, when we are looking back at John Oak Dalton’s film career at a
retrospective, people will comment that either his early films were better, or
this was just the start of his career and he’s grown so much. Directors like David
Cronenberg and George A. Romero go through this all the time. No, I’m not
comparing this film to theirs, but the philosophy is the same.
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| Andrew Britt |
Oaks started off
strong with directing his first feature, The Girl in the Crawlspace (2018).
I also believe, in part, that this strength comes from three places: the first
is that he has written a number of scripts before and has had the chance to initially
grow in that way; second, he has been involved with the filmmaking process for
a while with various directors so he’s had the opportunity to learn the craft;
and third, he is under the mentorship of his producer, Henrique Couto, who has
been making films in the Midwest for at least a decade (much as Gene Wilder did
with Mel Brooks). This release was mostly shot in and around Farmland, Indiana,
though filming was done as far as Dayton, Ohio.
It’s easy to tell that
Dalton’s strength, at this early part of his directorial career, is in the
screenwriting more than the helming of it, but that will take some time and
practice to catch up the two together. What I particularly like about the
script is that the characters are more fully developed than most indie films, the
dialog doesn’t talk down to the audience, and the plot is both simple and
nuanced at the same time.
Small town librarian
Winnie (Chelsi Kern, coincidentally a perfect last name for a character dealing
with text, may I add) gets ahold of a diary of a gay teen who had died, which of
course leads to a series of events related to that occurrence. Meanwhile, there
is the mysterious titular scarecrow that is going around killing people. While
you don’t need to be a rocket scientist to know these events are related, it’s how
it all works out that is the focus of the film.
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| Tom Cherry, Chelsi Kern, Rachel Redolfi |
Scarecrows are
certainly not new to the horror audience, but Dalton has taken a common trope
and played with it enough to make it interesting with the story’s own
psychological drama.
The film is populated
by a large and complex cast, including Winnie’s schizophrenic and agoraphobic cartoonist
sister Zoe (Rachael Redolfi) whose drawings speak to her (using the very identifiable
voice of Erin R. Ryan), Zoe’s promoter with the multicolored hair (Manic
Panic?) Marlys (Erin Hoodlebrink), the pent-up angry Prentiss (John Hambrick)
who has recently returned to town after a two-year service in Afghanistan, and
lots of the character’s dads and friends (few moms involved that are living, apparently,
despite the female-heavy cast).
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| Erin Hoodlebrink |
Being an independent
film director, Dalton wisely uses his budget in many ways, such as going to
where the particular actor is rather than bringing them necessarily together in
a room, and much of the interactive dialog is done over the phone: Zoe talks to
Marlys and Winnie often using the device; most of the dads connect that way, including
one to his girlfriend / sponsor (up-and-comer Joni Durian who stars in
Couto’s latest, Ouija Room).
Another way he wisely
saves some money on the production is holding off on prosthetics and digital SFX.
In other words, as this film is strongly story-oriented, all of the killings
are done off-screen. I commend this, even as I like some blood in my meat, but
again, if the story holds up as this one does, it becomes almost unnecessary
(even if noticeable).
That being said, the
scarecrow looks kind of cool. It’s mostly in the background, and often when a
kill is about to happen, it and the area around it are filled with blue smoke
and lights. It telegraphs what is going to happen, but honestly, it’s pretty
obvious, even with a few good jump scares.
If there is anything I
would to complain about, it’s the cheesy and stereotypical electronic music.
Just does not work for me, as it was a bit of a distraction from what’s on the
screen.
Much of the cast of The
Girl in the Crawlspace has returned for this new release. The acting is
mostly decent, especially among the female leads and the occasional male ones,
but most of the wooden portrayals are from those with the Y chromosomes. Again,
this is still in Dayton’s early stages. Have you seen some of the performances
in early Cronenberg’s work? Makes this look like Best in Show in comparison.
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| Henrique Couto and John Oak Dalton |
What compels this film
especially to be worth watching – beyond the editing, which is quite good – is the
writing. Sure, there are some really cool nuggets, such as the mention of the
band the Dead Milkmen (saw them play at Maxwell’s, in Hoboken, NJ, opening for
Salem 66; but I digress…), and even some dark humor thrown in here and there.
For a second feature,
it’s pretty obvious that Dayton can have a solid future in both writing and
directing. Let’s support that, and check out his films as I’m sure they are
bound to be floating around the festival circuit. I know The Girl in the
Crawlspace is about to get a wide circulation on various media, and it
probably won’t be long before this one will, as well.
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