Review of Scarecrow Gone Wild

This film begins with four college freshman submitting to a college initiation before being accepted into the baseball team. Although "Coach Ramsey" (Ken Shamrock) has strictly forbidden any hazing, the team captain "Mike" (David Zelina) arrogantly disobeys and takes them all to a cornfield out in the middle of nowhere. So when one of the freshman named "Sam" (Caleb Roehrig) resists he is subsequently tied to a scarecrow and left there for the rest of the night. What Mike doesn't know, however, is that Sam is a diabetic and as a result when he slips into a diabetic coma it slowly causes his life energy to drain into the nearby "Scarecrow" (played by Steven Worley). And needless to say, this scarecrow is filled with rage and thirsts for revenge upon the people who did this to Sam. Now rather than reveal any more I will just say that this film started out well enough but the director (Brian Katkin) seemed to lose his focus after the first 15 minutes or so as the film careened off the tracks not long afterward. For example, having a scarecrow in the middle of a cornfield at night makes sense-but not in the middle of the day at a beach alongside the Pacific Ocean. Equally odd was the fact that normally scarecrows are thin due to the fact that they are stuffed with just enough straw to do the trick--but this one was apparently composed of something else as he appeared to be rather overweight. Also, the fact that it killed everyone in its path-rather than just those who abused Sam-seemed like a bit of overkill to me as well. Admittedly, the acting wasn't totally bad and there were several attractive actresses like Lyndsay Douglas (as "Sara"), Kristina Sheldon ("Patty") and Lisa Robert ("Sandy") to enhance the scenery. But even so, it simply wasn't enough to overcome the obvious faults and I have rated this movie accordingly. Below average.