Dark Harvest (2023)
a review by Evan Landon
When this came out last year in 2023, this fantasy horror movie from director David Slade (Hard Candy, 30 Days Of Night, & Black Mirror: Bandersnatch) it flew very far under the radar; so much so, that it was only released at the legendary Alamo Drafthouse in Austin, TX for one night only two days before it was dropped to streaming. In fact, it was announced in 2019, but because of the whole unforeseen world shutting down (amongst other things), production had somewhat stalled and was then pushed back from 2021 to 2022, and then 2022 to 2023. There are a lot of stories just like that, so the indie films that were actually able to pull off their original release times were extremely fortunate.
What is Dark Harvest about, you ask?
Taking place during the 1960's, a small town in the rural midwest is celebrating its annual Halloween ritual called “The Run” in which the teenage boys of the town must stop a murderous scarecrow named “Sawtooth Jack” from entering the town's church before midnight and eat its candy insides or else the town will be decimated. The family also gets $25k, so that makes it easier for the parents of the kids to accept the dangers and allow the teens to go nuts. And nuts they definitely go. The story follows Richie, the brother of last year's winner, Jim, who is not allowed to join the “The Run” this year because a family member already won it the year before. The problem is that Jim has been missing that entire year, just like every winner before him.
Now, I know that sounds very farfetched, so if you see how complex of a premise this is, that just means the writer, Michael Gilio, tried his hardest to pack in everything he could in this little universe like an overstuffed burrito; so much of the story keeps falling out that you need a napkin to pick it up. Whenever a part would come up that made little to no sense what-so-ever, I would just remember that this is fantasy horror in its own little universe, a certain suspension of disbelief is warranted.
Speaking to the story, Dark Harvest was a originally a novel written in 2006 by Norman Partridge that won a bunch of literary awards that year in the horror category and it breaks down how the ritual works a whole lot better than the movie does. It would seem that Gilio did take a lot of liberties when writing the adaptation which would account for all the unexplained parts in the movie; explaining the rules of the “The Run”, why no girls are allowed to participate and only teenage boys, what makes them go insane, how nobody outside the town knows anything about this ritual, etc. Instead of adding some of those very important details could have definitely made the whole thing easier to understand, Gilio traded it for offing random teens that are never introduced that you could not give a shit less about. There was some pretty descent gore and “Sawtooth Jack” is pretty well done for being mostly CGI, so that is a definite plus.
Since it was dumped straight to streaming, it's difficult trying to figure out how to gauge a movie's profit margin exactly, but it did take just over $40 million to make, but looks a lot better than that dollar amount would suggest. I don't really care what critics think about anything, so I ain't looking that shit up. I will say this though: we need more movies with a wacky ass premise like this where you can tell everyone involved is having a great time being on the same page. Throw in some dumb ass teenagers getting mercked mercilessly and you got yourself a film, my friend.
Now, I am no psychic, by any means, but this could easily become a guilty pleasure for viewers in the years to come. Stranger shit has happened. Not as strange as the shit in this movie though.
3 Out Of 5