The Child

In spite of its ultra-low budget, clunky, overdubbed dialogue, and not-so convincing "acting", THE CHILD still manages to cultivate a cold atmosphere of constant dread. There are also some fairly gory set pieces.

As for the titular terror tot, Rosalie Nordon (Rosalie Cole), she's not a bad representative of the "killer kid" sub-genre. How can you go wrong with an eeevil girl who can create a murderous scarecrow AND raise the dead to form a mob of undead ghouls?

Add this to your horror roster...

When I say the "bread and butter" of 70s drive-in horror, I mean movies like this one came and went, forgotten and/or never seen by the majority. But it was films like this that kept drive-ins and smaller movie houses in business. I am so

thankful for the age of the DVD. With the DVD era, companies such as Anchor

Bay, Something Weird Video (Image), Blue Underground, Shriek Show, and

many others have brought back lost cult classics (and not so cult classics) so that new generations can discover them, and the older generations can

rediscover them.

"The Child" has all the right ingredients for a b-horror movie. A little bit of homemade special effect gore, a soundtrack that gives you the creeps, zombies, and it set in the countryside. It may have it's slow parts, but the final 20 minutes or so deliver the goods in fine 70s b-grade fashion. You will be getting startled one minute, then laughing the next (unintentionally of course).

This overdubed, somewhat disjointed horror film is probably more of a late to scene "Omen" rip-off than a zombie film; but if you are in the right mood you may find it creepily effective. There is an excellent scene about a half hour into the film where the old creep grandfather starts laughing at a horrible accident and the kid joins in. The other two don't know what to do, haven't we all been there? The disjointed sound actually may work in the film's favor, though you wonder if you are listening to the same people you are seeing on the screen. So it's hard to fault the performers too much. It's the kind of thing you might have seen at a faraway drive-in or late one night on cable and never quite shook. The Something Weird DVD gives you a chance to live it all again.

Rosilan (Rosalie Cole) is a girl with some problems-like her psychic abilities that allow her to talk to her dead mother, levitate objects, and raise the dead.

From producer Harry ("Axe","Rituals", "Hitch-Hike To Hell" and plenty of soft core flicks) Novak comes "The Child", an uneven but still watchable take on the Zombie movie. The movie itself takes a while to get going, and like many movies of this type, the acting is terrible (especially Rosalie Cole, whose character is too much of a brat to be interesting or threatening), and the electronic score by Rob Wallace is grating.

Still, when the final 20 minutes kick in, the movie kicks up. There's some nice moments, and the zombies themselves, while not Romero or Fulci levels, are still pretty creepy. The make up effects are also pretty good, especially considering the movie's budget.

"The Child" is an alright Bad Seed movie, only with the supernatural and the living dead instead of a killer kid. Don't go into it expecting much, and you might sort of enjoy it. It would make a nice double bill movie with "Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things", I'll tell you that.

Alicianne is hired to look after creepy 11-year-old Rosalie in her family's remote and gloomy house.It soon becomes clear that Rosalie has psychic powers and can make things move just by thinking about it-and she can also use those same powers to raise the dead,reanimating corpses in a nearby cemetery to take revenge after her mentally ill mother dies...A spooky and atmospheric opening scene gives way to a sluggish and wholly predictable zombie movie that has little new to add to an already over-crowded sub-genre.Technically,it's a mess and the acting is as dire as you'd expect,yet it does occasionally manage to display flashes of that creepiness that informed the opening scene."The Child" was released by exploitation king Harry Novak("Axe"),so fans of low-budget 70's horror should be pleased.This film has its share of flaws,but give it a chance.7 out of 10.