poe426 I saw WHO CAN KILL A CHILD?, under the title ISLAND OF THE DAMNED, at the drive-in and I'd all but forgotten the opening montage. Rather they'd merely REFERENCED the killings of children around the world than SHOWING it: it makes the movie as mere entertainment much harder to take than it should be. It's for inclusion of this monstrous montage that I can't give the movie a higher rating. It IS suspenseful at times, and there ARE some sudden "GOTCHA!" moments that make it worth seeing, but the opening is VERY hard to take (as are the first 20 minutes or so of the movie proper, which play out like somebody's home movie or travel videos). When the couple, biologist Tom and his pregnant wife Evelyn, arrive on the island, they find it deserted. Upon investigation, Tom begins to discover the bodies of apparent murder victims. Evelyn is visited by a young girl, who places her face against Evelyn's belly. (This becomes significant late in the movie.) When Tom and Evelyn see a young girl take a cane from an old man and proceed to beat him to death with it, Tom tries to reassure his wife that the old man wasn't actually killed. She doesn't buy it, of course, and, before long, there's no doubt that there are killer children on the island (Almazora) and that they're out for ADULT blood. (This somehow ties into the opening montage...) When they meet a survivor of the island massacre that preceded their arrival, they ask him why he didn't intervene to try to save his own wife. His response: "Who can kill a child...?" (My, how the times they done changed...) He refers to the rampage as "some sort of madness." He's later led off to his (offscreen) death by his own daughter. At one point, Tom finds a group of boys undressing the corpse of a woman; they run at the sight of him, giggling as they go. He muses that maybe the mass murders are some new "instinct... or evolutionary development..." When the couple flee to a house near the shore, a pair of killer kids arrive and telepathically hypnotize the kids who live there. (They STARE at the normal kids and we hear strange sound fx suggesting that some kind of mind control is being used...) When the couple is cornered,and it looks like they may get away, Evelyn's unborn baby kills her from the inside- the result of a thought implanted by the girl who earlier put her face against Evelyn's belly. (A special shout out to THE CINEFILES- Edwin Samuelson, Eric Cohen, Jeff Gallaway, and Michael Foltz- whose shows I've just discovered on YouTube: they mentioned this movie under its original title and that's how I was able to track down a copy. Thanks, fellas!)

Countorloc I rather liked Who Can Kill a Child. It relies a great deal on mood, suspense and strong, strangely frightening images. It is not a typical horror film, having a Picnic at Hanging Rock-vibe to its eery, daylight desertion. For especially the images are what makes the film with the excellent photography of surreal horror. That being said the mood is really what drives the film as little quality in the field of writing or acting shines through for the most part. Especially the writing suffers. The dialogue just doesn't flow naturally possibly because the scriptwriters were Spanish. Especially the wife character is given some truly cringe worthy lines besides not having to do much so as to advance the story. The husband, the protagonist for by far the most part, often acts eerily illogically. This occasionally results in unintentionally humorous moments because of both the writers' and actors' shortcomings. However this is mostly during the first half were the couple's banter is in focus. The other, being much more action oriented works much better and the couple is much more appealing leading to some truly distressing scenes. Perhaps this occurs because there is a better translation of themes (as fear is a universal feeling, whereas it is difficult to characterize the ordinary, but specific). As such it is a film the qualities of which surpass the anachronisms and general writing and acting problems. It is a very imperfect great film.

tomgillespie2002 Produced the year before the publication of Stephen King's short story Children of the Corn (which was subsequently made into a film in 1983), Who Can Kill a Child? is very similar in it's main idea. An English couple, Tom (Lewis Fiander), and his pregnant wife Evelyn (Prunella Ransome), arrive on a small island off of the mainland of Spain as tourists. On entering the small village, they find the place to be deserted. After some time searching for locals, they discover that the children have turned on the adult population, systematically killing all of them.During the opening credits of the film, a narrator describes - with the aid of documentary imagery - the many atrocities on humanity of the 20th century; from the concentration camps of world war 2, to the napalm bombing of Vietnam. In all of these, we are confronted with the very reality of the situations and the concept that within all of these inhumane acts, that children are the most innocent of victims. In a previous review (#106) for Devil Times Five (1975), I mentioned the 1970's trope for evil children. This is self evident within this narrative. As this concept was outlined within the context of American social change, I feel a slightly colloquial reading is needed for this Spanish film. In the 1960's and '70's, British tourism went further than it's usual boundaries of the UK. The gateways of Spain were flooded with these pale-skinned holiday-makers. Also, the children of this island are the last of Spanish dictator Franco's children. Franco died in 1975, meaning there was at last freedom, and Spaniards could move on from the devastation of the civil war. These children could represent the anger left by the atrocities of this period. They may well represent a new Spain which needs to move on; or the kids could be the remnants of Franco's ideas. But fundamentally, these kids want to destroy the adults that for years let themselves be dictated by a murdering president.The children of the film perpetuate (for me at least), the concept that they are intrinsically evil. Kids are f*****g monsters! The island children form a kind of collective psychic-psychosis, which can be projected onto other children; something that Evelyn finds out the hard way, as her unborn child kills her inside the womb after it has been possessed. After the island is rid of all adults, it would be time to move this psychic possession of children to the mainland. This is haunting stuff. The film is atmospheric, and has more tension than the film of Children of the Corn. It's a surprise that this film was forgotten. Chilling, disturbing: It also raises a fundamental question of morality: Who can kill a child? (as illustrated in the title used here - it is one of many other titles such as Island of Death, Death is Child's Play et al). Well, going back to the Brit-tourist invasion, it seems that an Englishman is the only kind that is capable of such a horrific act. Watch out Spain, the Brits are invading!www.the-wrath-of-blog.blogspot.com

Gloede_The_Saint This film made be consider breaking through the 4th wall and kill these morons myself. I know some people like it. I don't get it. I'm sorry, but his is one of the dumbest films I have ever seen. It's just plain F-ing stupid. I suppose people like having their braincells get massacred.Children turns into evil killers, OK. We have seen that in Children of the Damned. Evil "zombie" children can work. But here we have a idiot tourist couple who sees loads of people murdered/dead and act like nothing is going on. That idiot leading man just walks around and leaves his wife defenseless time and time again though he knows that the children are killers. And even worse! They have a problem with killing these children? Why? It's not a moral dilemma if they are trying to F-ing KILL YOU! It's just ridiculous. And the opening? What? Yes children die all around the world, so what? A horrid attempt to play smart. Ah so the point is that the children are fighting back, how brilliant. First of all the way they are all just hypnotized and turns into monsters on the spot is just dumb, at least in a movie that tries to be about "reality" and suffering. If it had been some supernatural fairytale or if we knew the origins it could have worked somewhat better, but lets just drop that. No matter what this is just ridiculous and horrible.It was nicely framed though. That and the fact that it actually makes you want to rip out the lungs of these children, which I suppose was what they wanted is the reason why it does not get a 1.