Bride of Scarecrow (2019) by Louisa Warren

Director: Louisa Warren
Year: 2019
Country: United Kingdom
Alternate Titles: N/A
Genre: Scarecrow Slasher

Plot:
After being fired from her radio show, a woman and her friends learn she has inherited a strange farmhouse out in the countryside, and when they travel to the location find that she’s in line to stop a devastating family curse from unleashing a murderous scarecrow from killing her friends.

Review:

For the most part, this here was a decent enough if underwhelming effort. When this one works, it's mainly due to the rather intriguing setup that gives a great detail for the scarecrow haunting the land. Given a great backstory involving a person mistakenly killed and cursed to roam the land as a scarecrow following the incident and looking to reclaim the lost bride he never got which is the reincarnation of the new girl, this gives off a solid and far more enjoyable setup than expected. Featuring the extra bit about the family being aware of this and taking on the role of protectors manages to provide some really enjoyable setups here that come to pass in the second half where the curse is given life to the scarecrow and results in some fine suspenseful moments throughout the farmhouse. However, these here are all that work for the film.

There are several big flaws to be had with this one. The main flaw here is the film’s utterly laughable and hilarious slasher setups that just make the film a pain to sit through. There’s almost nothing here in this regard that works, as the scarecrow is laughably bad and so silly that it’s nearly impossible to be scared of this thing with his burlap sack stitched in a crude, haphazard manner that looks really lousy. On top of that, the other scenes here are incredibly underwhelming and slipshod which makes this one feel really slapdash with scenes featuring the scarecrow suddenly appearing behind someone and then sloppily throwing them around or attacking them when it’s been underwhelmed because of some unbelievable circumstance that allows the scarecrow to attack from that spot. With little to no gore at all from any of these, the deaths are some of the most disappointing elements here.

The other factor with this one is the agonizing slow-burn pace that drains the energy from this one completely. That the opening flashback to the first victims learning of their family legacy and then getting wiped out takes way too long and could’ve been trimmed down since it doesn’t need fifteen minutes to tell this tale, and the exploits of her job feel like padding to justify her moving to the farm. As well, the start/stop nature of the investigation into what happened to the previous owners causes even more time to get dragged out by stalling all the information needed, which all pushes the rampage so later into the film that the few signs of life that are generated from this come off as too little, too late with the film in need of some trimming due to the excessive and dragging scenes. These here are the film’s main issues.

Overview: *.5/5

A watchable if highly flawed genre effort, there are some likable factors here that are somewhat undone by the more prominent flaws featured here  Give it a look if you're a fan of this kind of indie feature or of the creative crew, while most others who are turned off by the flaws here should heed caution.