Who Can Come Out and Play?

1976’s Who Can Kill a Child? was one of the most surprisingly terrifying film experiences I’ve had in recent years. Slow-building and filmed in sunshine, it packed supremely horrifying punches with no mercy and an intriguing audio style that sometimes went silent to highlight the austerity of its scares. Were I a genre filmmaker, I would most certainly head to that well for inspiration and guidance in making an effective horror movie.

Or maybe I’d just copy it.

Quick Plot: See: original review.

Because you see, save for the original’s depressing documentary-like prologue, this is the same. Exact. Movie.

Directed, edited, and cinematographed (director of photographed?) by masked man of mystery Makinov, Come Out and Play is certainly a well-made film. The Mexican setting is gorgeous, and Makinov shows strong skill behind the camera with some stylish (but not distractingly so) shots. Actors Ebon Moss-Bachrach and Vinessa Shaw (yes, she of Ladybugs and the remake of The Hills Have Eyes) hold our attentions without issue. The score is effectively subtle. 

This is a good modern horror film.

Except, you know, it’s also just a 2012 version of Who Can Kill a Child?, which was an outstanding horror film. 

I’m not one of those horror fans who breaks out into hives and rants when the word ‘remake’ is spoken aloud. There are a lot reasons to revisit old cinematic material, and plenty of examples of when such a retread can produce something worthwhile. Generally, though, ‘revisiting old cinematic material just to use a 21st century lens’ isn’t one of them.

Not quite shot for shot, but certainly scene for scene, Come Out and Play brings absolutely nothing new to its source material. It also doesn’t help to fix any of the minor issues of the original, following every beat even when it could have improved (i.e., giving no real backstory to why a couple with two children would be on a luxury vacation when the missus is two months away from delivering her third). If I want to start getting catty, I’ll add that our lead characters lost my sympathy just as the third act got underway when they left a very helpful islander to her presumed death at the tiny hands of monster children (if this happened in the original, it didn’t feel quite as unpleasant or white privileged). Makinov does raise the gore quotient with a brief and disturbing montage of the children playing with spare adult parts, but it’s not really enough to justify this as its own film. Come Out and Play is a good movie, and a well-made horror film, but when there’s a slightly more disturbing blueprint on my DVD shelf, I fail to see the point.

High Points

Look, I can’t argue with the filmmaking: it looks great, sounds great, and certainly shows that Makinov can make a decent horror movie

Low Points

...it just would’ve been nice if I hadn’t already seen this more-than-decent horror movie

Considering it pretty much takes everything from Who Can Kill a Child?, it’s baffling to wonder why it would forego the awesomely terrifying human pinata that the original film used to such shocking effect

I don’t know about you, but after reading this article about Makinov’s eccentricity, I kind of want to hate everything he has ever touched while obnoxiously wearing a mask

Lessons Learned

Just because a herd of violent children are chasing you down doesn’t mean you should grab the spare handgun laying on hand, right?

I said it before, and I see no reason to not say it again: taking a motorized boat low on gas to an isolated island in very hot weather with your very pregnant wife is in no way the smartest idea you’ve ever had, I hope

Eh, anything else I learned was taught by Narciso Ibanez Serrador’s original

Rent/Bury/Buy

Let me tell you a scary story kids, one that might very well be the worst fear of any Netflix subscriber. The day I received Come Out and Play in the mail, I happened to log into my account to see that usually welcome blue ‘play’ button next to its name. That’s right: the DVD I queued was now on Instant Watch. 

KILL ME NOW, amiright?

Thankfully, the DVD includes a charming making-of that shows the rascally child actors learning about squibs. No, that doesn’t make up for the fact that I GOT THE DVD OF A MOVIE ON INSTANT WATCH, but there are bigger issues in the world that should make me angry (like the fact that Playtex discontinued my favorite bra; this world is very hard on me).

Anyway, as for the movie, it’s certainly well-made and attractively filmed. At the same time, the original Who Can Kill a Child? is, at least to me, one of the scariest films of all time. To just copy every scene doesn’t necessarily translate that fear. It’s a tricky thing to recommend: I’d much rather tell anybody to see the first film (so really, just go see the first film). If you’ve already seen Ibanez’s telling, this VERY close remake will just feel like a prettier carbon copy. 

What's the Matter With Kids Today?

I was thinking last week how it’s been too long since I’ve watched an actual scary movie. Ignore, for a moment, the fact that about 233 out of the 250 titles currently on my Netflix queue are classified as horror and accept that films such as Rabid Grannies and Bio Zombie aren’t intended to give a gal like me nightmares.

My life, you might say, was wanting.

After a few shuffles and hopeful mailbox openings, I’m happy to report that I have been disturbed. Who Can Kill a Child?, a 1976 film from Spain, is sufficiently frightening and wrong enough to satisfy the masochist inside.

This one got to me.

From the brutal stock footage of dying refugee children that opens the film to the cheerfully sinister afternoon swim of the closing credits, Who Can Kill a Child? is a a rough ride. Obviously, that makes it a hearty recommendation.

Quick Plot: As all-too-real images of abused children roll in black and white, a narrator takes us through some of the atrocities suffered by children in the 20th century--medical experimentations in Auschwitz, orphans of war in Vietnam, starvation in Nigeria. Man commits a lot of crime, but nobody suffers more for it than the defenseless youths...until now.

On a tourist-filled beach off the coast of Spain, a happy British couple decides to celebrate the upcoming birth of their third child with a romanic getaway to the secluded island of Almanzara. They dock their boat with the help of some kids that are quiet but seemingly cheerful, save for one surly banged boy with a slight resemblance to Suri Cruise. 

Tom and Evelyn wander the hauntingly quiet town, enjoying the peacefulness and assuming the entire population is celebrating a holiday or savoring a siesta. Because they've apparently never seen a horror movie, the couple continue on, stopping occasionally to catch a glance of giggling tweens and answer ominous phone calls. They (and director Narciso Ibanez Serrador) take their time in realizing that something is clearly amiss and very bad things are about to happen.

Do they ever. These kids make the Children of the Corn look like a herd of pocket protector wearing members of the National Honor Society. With no explanation of why or how, the Almanzaritos have taken over with pitchforks and vengeance. Goodbye, homework and vegetables. Hello, human pinatas and ice cream breakfasts (okay, I’m just assuming the second part because that’s how I would have rebelled).

Who Can Kill a Child? is a freaky and fascinating ride for most of the way through. Its nearly 2 hour running time does drag here and there, but once the kids take charge, we (along with the baffled and not entirely bright adults) are stranded in a hell unlike the usual horror fare. The children seem to operate from a hive mind (a la Village of the Damned) but there is no sermonizing to explain the motives behind their sudden blood thirst. Imagine Peter Pan’s Lost Boys, but without the childhood sense of adventure. There is humor to be found, but it’s uncomfortably macabre, not campy or cute, made all the more disturbing by the bright eyes and giddy smiles on the bat-wielding pre-teens with a complete lack of sympathy.

High Points
Serrador‘s decision to not score some of the early scenes (pre-pinata) add an eerie level of discomfort that keeps both the audience and characters on edge

The acapella lullaby of the opening calls to mind another would-you-kill-a-child? classic, Rosemary’s Baby

Pregnancy in horror films requires some big plot explosion, and this one is an insanely upsetting doozy

Low Points
I’ll accept the 70sness of marital relations, but did Evelyn have to be such a dumb blond? Sample line: “Gracias. Is that what they say here?” Really? You have to ask?

Lessons Learned
It’s generally not a good ideal to travel to a nearly deserted island when you’re 6+ months pregnant

All Italians are fascists

Sociopathic and intensely violent kids take the driving age very seriously

Rent/Bury/Buy
I somehow had never seen this cult classic until recently, but I’m actually quite thankful I watched it at this point in my own life. Having young children in my family lets the significance of the title feel as deep and wrong as it should, but not having kids of my own makes me able to actually view it (those of you who turned off Inside due to its subject matter should probably avoid Who Can Kill a Child?). I’ve heard some reviews call it out for being too dated or cheesy, but I found this to be one of the most disturbing films I’ve seen in some time. The DVD isn’t overly extra heavy, but an intriguing interview with Serrador gives some nice behind the scene tidbits (like how much he disliked lead actor Lewis Fiander). This is a film for fans with patience for mood setting and the stomach for true horror.