The Harvest is John McNaughton's first film in nearly 15 years. That's a big leap, pushing two decades, yet McNaughton does not seem to have missed a beat. The film contains elements of horror, fantasy and psychological thrillers but is paced so smoothly, so meticulously, that the subject matter is irrelevant because he's fleshed out his characters so well.
The Harvest tells the tale of Andy Young (Charlie Tahan), a boy of about 13 who is made victim to a debilitating illness. He's bedridden, dejected and sheltered to the point of not knowing how to grip a baseball. His mother, Dr. Katherine Young (Morton) is pumping him full of black-market medicines, while his retired nurse father, Richard (Michael Shannon) tries to lift his spirits. This strange equilibrium is then pinched, when Maryann (Natasha Calis) a recently orphaned girl, moves in nearby, with her grandparents. Unnerved by the move, Natasha runs out into the woods, and conveniently winds up at the window besides Andy's bed. She befriends the seemingly paralyzed boy, but the more she pokes her head in at the Young household, the more she is taunted and cast away. Maryann is persistent, though, and decides to cling on to Andy no matter the cost. After a few more trips, she discovers something in the Young basement that throws everything off the rails, that jabs at viewers like one of the sharp IV needles stuck in Andy's arm.
The naked trees and crippled corn stalks in the film make for some rightfully haunting mise-en-scene. For one, they ring similar to David Koepp's Secret Window, and the frames appear almost like something out of a James Wan film, sans the ghostly apparitions. Lastly, the edits are sharp and the music from George S. Clinton is first-class. Even still, the film is riddled by some genre cliches -- child separation, 'what's in the basement' -- but they do not hinder the overall direction of this entertaining film.
This is a film whose performers breathe life into a serviceable screenplay, not the other way around. While ambitious and pleasantly fantastical, the screenplay does not overpower the actors. Samantha Morton, Natasha Calis, Michael Shannon, Peter Fonda, and Charlie Tahan each bring a a distinct flare to the screen. It is a hypnotic Morton and the amiable Calis, though, who make this film one to remember, possibly even a cult classic, because there is plenty of "cult." Viewers go through the movie oscillating back and forth, wondering whether to like Michael Shannon's character (it helps that the actor is a pleasure to watch). That said, audiences should experience something similar: they'll be unsure of what's what, who's who and just what is unraveling around Dr. Katherine Young.
