Cosecha mortifera

After several disastrous harvests, people from the cities are venturing into rural areas hoping to procure food to feed their families. Compounding the problem is that the farmers are also experiencing the same issues and there simply isn't enough food to go around. As a result, the cities are placed under martial law while small vigilante groups are set up in the country to prevent armed groups from urban areas looting nearby farms. Although one particular farmer by the name of "Grant Franklin" (Clint Walker) disagrees with the need for these vigilante groups, what he doesn't know is that the politicians have been deliberately misleading the populace and things are about to get much worse for everybody. Now rather than reveal any more, I will just say that this film definitely had potential. Unfortunately, it lacked the necessary drama and suspense due in large part to the stoic manner of the main character. To that effect, in spite of everything happening all around, nothing seemed to faze him. At least, not initially. Be that as it may, while I don't consider this to be a bad film by any means, I honestly wasn't that impressed with it and I have rated it accordingly. Slightly below average.

Welcome to the taupe movie. Everything in the film is taupe.....the actors' skin and hair, their clothes, the ground, the sky.... My God! How bleak can it get?! The movie details the plight of North America when global weather patterns shift causing crops to freeze and harvests to be lost. The government realizes that there is no food left and before long, it's every man for himself. Walker (one time Greek God who now looks rather haggard and is desperately trying to give this poor film some heart) plays a farmer who becomes a target of vigilantes because he has things like chickens, vegetables and a cow. Brown is a desperate city dweller whose daughter is in dire need of proper nutrition and whose money now does him no good at all. Persoff is a heartless entrepreneur who's been hoarding food all along in order to be a player during the shortage. All the elements converge during a wedding ceremony when some men try to steal the bounty of food that's been offered as a present. Then a string of violent events continues until the fade out. The idea of the film is somewhat ambitious (though not entirely original.) The execution of it (mostly due to the severely low budget and the amateurism of the acting) is agonizing. The opening of the film is horrendous. Anonymous businessmen talk (and talk) about the situation with camera setups and sound that's probably worse than most underground pornography of the time. The rough lighting and photography continue throughout the film which, as stated earlier, exists in a bleak pallet of tan, taupe and brown with occasional splashes of navy blue. Some really lame actors attempt to portray despair and emotion in the face of the situation, but mostly they come off as laughable. Whelan, as Brown's elderly father and Greenhalgh as Walker's wife are chief offenders here. Cattrall has an early role here as Walker's daughter. The part has little to it, but she performs adequately for the most part. The thing is, the film wants to be serious and foreboding, but it's so melodramatic and trite and done with such little style that it doesn't stand much of a chance. If one were to remove the shots of cars/trucks driving down desolate roads, the film would likely run 40 minutes!

Just watched Deadly Harvest, then noticed a distinct lack - and recent vintage - of IMDb comments about it. But I ain't even gonna TRY to sway ya: You're gonna hafta make up your OWN mind about this one. You probably won't regard your time and/or money to have been wasted if you view this. But, neither do I believe that it's one of the greatest movies ever made, although a considerable percentage of IMDb voters apparently feel that way. It's got an uncomplicated premise: because of global COOLING, the food supply has become inadequate - nothing new in some parts of the world; but, in THIS film, in North America, as well. That's as much SCIENCE fiction as there is, however. The rest of the picture focuses on character behavior resultant from this circumstance. Therefore, the heavy reliance on acting, and not much else. I'll leave it up to you to decide who, if any of, and how, the thespians might imperfectly execute their craft. My impression is that it's done well enough to take seriously, but just average.

If this film has a mesdsage it's a somewhat mted one in that if they really want to farmers rule. In the end food is what's the most important thing, more than any other commodity that we place value on.

A famine has come on the earth as a result of our slovenly industrial practices and we see it from two points of view. Clint Walker who is head of your typical American farm family trying to survive and Nehemiah Persoff head of a blakc market food ring in a nearby midwestern city.

Deadly Harvest is a cheaply made film which has faded shades of that other post apocalyptic film On The Beach ithout the power, poetry, and stars of the latter.

The message as I said before is a mted one.and muted. Taken to its logical conclusion Archer,Daniels,Midland and companies like that will rule the planet.

"To most of us, it came as a surprise. Not many understood. Too few cared enough to stop it. Then, it no longer mattered how many understood or cared. It was too late.

The beginning of the end came in the late '70s. The climate changes... the energy crisis, the shortages, the high costs of growing and transporting grain, the lack of government support for research programs. The disappearance of arable land beneath the monoliths of reinforced concrete and steel as the urban centers continued their unchecked sprawl into the countryside. The industrial pollution that poisoned the earth, the water, and the air. And the continuing growth of population out of all bounds of reason. More and more people, less and less food.

By the end of the '70s, the fabric of society was breaking down in most parts of he world... And then, the bubble burst."

So begins a cautionary tale from the sages in Hollywood, who even thirty years ago were desperately trying to warn us unwashed masses about the dangers of climate change facing us. Sounds familiar, doesn't it?

So what is "The World's Scourge" as described in the movie's tagline? GLOBAL COOLING!

Draw your own conclusions.

P.S. - This would make a great double feature with "An Inconvenient Truth".