The Reaping: DVD Review, Blu-ray Review, HD DVD Review (2007)

Between the film’s fainting cows (hilarious!), its lice-ridden children (bilious!) and its skies that rain frogs (amphibious!), the big draw here--according to the marketing campaign--are the computer-generated locusts, which pull an "Exorcist II" on audiences by swarming the screen in flocks of undulating evil.

There isn’t a can of Raid big enough to kill these beasts, so one might instead consider turning that can on the movie itself.

From Stephen Hopkins, the film stars Academy Award-winner Hilary Swank as Katherine Winter, a former missionary minister who has ditched her relationship with God in favor of using science to explain away alleged miraculous events. Essentially, she's a biblical buzz kill.

Now a Louisiana State University professor, Katherine joins others in descending upon Haven, a Louisiana backwater in which the stereotypes run high and the rivers have turned red with blood in the wake a little boy’s murder.

The presumed murderer is the boy’s sister, Loren (AnnaSophia Robb), who the townspeople are convinced has brought about the 10 biblical plagues, which the film ticks off one by one, with Katherine eventually running out of ways to explain them away.

The trouble with "The Reaping" goes beyond its canned horror, its lack of logic and coherence, and its one-note performances. By intentionally recalling such superior horror films as "The Omen" and "The Exorcist," it sets itself up for failure if it doesn’t match their excellence.

It doesn't.

Rated R. Grade: D

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