Clown in a Cornfield Delivers on its Title, And Little Else

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A title like Clown in a Cornfield would seem to portend one of two things, to a wizened genre geek. The most likely possibility is that we’re talking about a zero budget, sub-Asylum tier piece of dreck intended solely for a streaming market where it’s hoping to rope in a few curious viewers who can’t resist a saucy title, ultimately gathering dust next to other quasi-features like Zoombies or Amityville in Space. The second possibility is that the title is itself parodic of the likes of Snakes on a Plane, and that the film serves as satire of cheapo horror filmmaking convention, a sort of Cabin in the Woods for the bargain bin, elevated from mundanity by a quick wit and more genre savvy approach. Director Eli Craig’s SXSW-premiering slasher intends wholeheartedly to assign itself to the second of those camps, but in doing so it veers dangerously close to the first; parody that struggles to match the execution and vivaciousness of the very things it’s satirizing. It benefits from a strong central protagonist’s performance, but is simultaneously let down by a screenplay that collapses under the slightest bit of scrutiny. Clown in a Cornfield simply isn’t as smart as it needs to be in order to prove that it’s more than its title.

That’s a shame, coming from Tucker & Dale vs. Evil director Craig, who has seemingly been casting about since 2010 in the hopes of replicating a film that is now rightly regarded as an all-time classic modern horror comedy, one that intelligently plays with character perception, stereotypes and “main character syndrome.” His one other feature since Tucker & Dale was 2017 Netflix horror comedy Little Evil, a film that similarly attempted to expand audience empathy toward another horror trope–the Omen-style evil child–to significantly more watered down results. Now he’s back to adapt 2020 YA story Clown in a Cornfield from horror novelist Adam Cesare, and although there are flashes of good humor on display, particularly in terms of the screenplay’s light satirization of Gen Z self-absorption and Boomer greed, none of it is nearly enough to enliven what is, at heart, a classical slasher much more than it is a true horror comedy. And the fact of the matter is, Clown in a Cornfield isn’t much of a slasher, lacking in both scares and visceral impact, beyond the fact that it creates very little mystique or elemental power for its would-be iconic antagonist, “Frendo the Clown.”

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Clown in a Cornfield follows “teen” protagonist Quinn Maybrook (Katie Douglas, in her mid-20s in classic slasher fashion) as she moves to the small, rural city of Kettle Springs, Missouri with her mourning doctor father (Aaron Abrams, looking very Leland Orser-esque), following the tragic death of her mother. There, she befriends the sort of perfectly multicultural, multiracial melange of fellow teens that a focus group might have assembled as an ideal high school clique, absorbing the local town legends from this group of relatively shiftless kids who are seemingly detested with a burning passion by every single adult in town. The kids, you see, have been blamed for the recent destruction of the Baypen Corn Syrup factory, a symbolic loss that represents the rural town’s already long-ongoing economic stagnation. Their only hobby and outlet, meanwhile, has been a successful online video streaming channel where the teens fabricate scary videos starring the former Baypen Corn Syrup mascot, the garish clown known as Frendo. Ah, but what if there’s a real Frendo lurking in the digital static of their so-called prank videos, ready to start bumping off Quinn’s new friends in a seeming bit of vengeance for his lost livelihood?

Douglas, it should be noted, is the strongest element that Clown in a Cornfield has to offer, being one of the more engaging and genuinely likable centerpieces for a modern slasher film I’ve encountered in recent memory. One expects the archetype of a character like Quinn to be defined by her grief and attendant feelings of shyness or insecurity–instead, she’s shockingly forward and assertive in her interactions with her new peers, displaying a ferocity and confidence that makes her inherently likable, and a character we want to learn more about. The adults in town, meanwhile, warn her vociferously to avoid this group, despite them being pretty much the only other teens who appear to exist in this place–are there no stoners and burnouts in Kettle Springs? It’s funny to see the portly town sheriff (Will Sasso) tell the new girl in town to avoid the affable, attractive, seemingly popular high school clique: They’re kids who in any other context would presumably be cast as the town’s proudest achievement.

Regardless, Quinn quickly makes a new circle of acquaintances, being immediately drawn to the relatively affluent but disaffected Cole (Carson MacCormac), whose gladhanding father Arthur (Kevin Durand) is the city’s mayor, the man tasked with making empty promises of a return to prosperity in a place where most people have seemingly given up. The divide between Cole and his dad illustrates the one ideological point the film is ever really trying to make: Kids today are just trying to get by on the table scraps of what the retiring generation has deigned to leave them. There’s a fairly pointed critique of the stereotypically Boomer mentality toward hoarding of resources, lingering in huge houses they don’t need through their golden years rather than freeing up those places for the next generation. As one character bitterly opines, “If you can’t have everything the way you want it, you’d rather burn it all to the ground.”

But wait, wasn’t there a clown involved in all of this? Suffice to say, “Frendo” never manages to feel much like a proper character, or even a general slasher archetype, for reasons that at one moment around Clown in a Cornfield’s midpoint feel mildly clever, but ultimately prove limiting to what Craig is able to do with the character. A reveal that feels like it might open up new possibilities (echoing Hot Fuzz of all things) instead walls Craig and co. into something of a narrative corner, one that eventually forces its protagonist to bluntly ask her attacker the equivalent of “Who are you and why are you doing this?”, only to receive a full explanation that beggars all forms of belief. Suffice to say, the film ultimately suffers from these increasingly nonsensical motivations, even judging by the forgiving standards of the genre–as it likewise suffers again through a clumsy, sequel-baiting conclusion that forces its characters to not even acknowledge the plot threads that have been left dangling.

Much of this clumsiness could be forgiven if Clown in a Cornfield at least functioned as an occasionally scary slasher, but despite a smattering of solid FX work, there’s scant atmosphere or feeling of weight behind its various blows. The first few kills in particular only draw attention to how much is missing in terms of the film’s emulation of classical ‘80s slashers, which the film seems to want to evoke without actually being able to match.

Case in point: There’s a death at one point in Clown in a Cornfield that involves an jock-ish type who is killed while lifting weights in a home garage setup, which can’t help but remind a golden age slasher junkie of the death of Debbie, an athlete who is similarly killed while pumping iron in 1988’s A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master. But where the weight-lifting girl of Nightmare not only gets crushed by her weights, shattering her arms and bending them back in a hideous display of practical FX, she then ends up being transformed into a cockroach in an incredibly gooey, gnarly sequence that preys on the character’s fear of bugs. The whole thing is a masterpiece of FX work and squishy grand guignol, orchestrated by the quip-making Freddy. By comparison, the weight-lifting character here … well, he’s killed in a rather obvious, blink-and-you’ll-miss-it fashion, a death that is forgotten and discarded by the audience as soon as it’s witnessed. The Nightmare sequence must have taken days or weeks to film, all on its own. The Clown in a Cornfield one? Probably knocked out in an afternoon.

It’s perfectly indicative of how expectations for this sort of FX-driven, gory slasher work have been vastly reduced from what the same audience would have expected to see in their films 40 years ago. The kids of the mid-‘80s would have looked at the kills of Clown in a Cornfield and yawned, and understandably so. It’s not that we’re expecting Terrifier-esque levels of gore and grossness, but … well, there’s a reason why you’ll probably see lots of people dressed as Art the Clown this Halloween season, rather than Frendo. Even after seeing this film, most people wouldn’t recognize a Frendo costume, or be able to pick one out from the dozens of other evil clowns populating the shelves of your average Spirit Halloween. Nothing about the character seems destined to stick in the cultural consciousness, which makes the overt sequel planning feel dubious at best.

Clown in a Cornfield is not hurting for pleasant vibes in its main and supporting cast, and the light ribbing of generational foibles–like the pack of Gen Z kids encountering a rotary phone and being totally panicked and mystified by how to dial with it–can be quite effective in the moment. But as a legitimate horror feature, even one culled from YA horror fiction, it’s all just too watered down, too nonsensical in its character motivations, and too dependent upon the lingering goodwill that Tucker & Dale vs. Evil has afforded Craig over the years. The SXSW crowd may have exulted at Clown in a Cornfield, but its festival shine seems destined to wear off sooner rather than later, leaving nothing more than an empty pair of floppy shoes.

Director: Eli Craig
Writer: Eli Craig, Carter Blanchard
Stars: Katie Douglas, Aaron Abrams, Carson MacCormac, Kevin Durand, Will Sasso
Release date: May 9, 2025

Jim Vorel is Paste’s Movies editor and resident genre geek. You can follow him on Twitter or on Bluesky for more film writing.