It's the end of the world as we know it. Cause? A massive lack of food resources. Yes, freak weather conditions have caused starvation on a massive scale, and it's not too long before neighbour turns on neighbour in the quest for a good meal.
Clint Walker plays the heroic farmer who, in an effort to keep his family fed, fights off all sorts of unsavoury characters. People will do literally anything to get their hands on a bit of grub...including murder.
Deadly Harvest is an interesting attempt to show how quickly society can collapse when faced with crisis, and how fast man will resort to primate savageness in order to save his own skin.
The film concentrates on two families, at first the closest of friends, then embedded in a bitter feud of survival of the fittest. But it's not just his pals that Clint has to contend with. It's a world where the richest man is he who has a well stocked larder (or in Clint's case, a farm full of fodder). However, with no law and only disorder, the richest man is also target no. 1.
Released only limitedly in 1976, Deadly Harvest is a member of the popular end-of-the-World subgenre. It's all bleak here, the ending only promise that things will get worse. Is this a terrifying vision of things to come? Convincing performances, and good direction by Timothy Bond certainly give it a feel of realism that at times is unsettling.
Ultimately however, this is fairly familiar territory, the family unit facing the apocalypse has all been done before ('Panic in the Year Zero!' With Ray Milland for example), and it all seems a little tame. What surprised me more than anything was that there wasn't even one reference to cannibalism! Is this really a HSF (horror,sci-fi and fantasy) Film?
In fairness, considering that the film was produced on a very low budget, and is virtually unheard of, this is a bad effort at all. If nothing else, it serves as a stark warning to farmers; if you think things are bad now, it's only going to get far far worse!
"Interesting" Facts: Clint Walker starred in several genre made-for-TV movies, including, 'Scream of the Wolf', 'Snowbeast' and 'Killdozer'. This was Timothy Bond's directorial debut. He went on to make the 1992 version of 'The Lost World' and several TV episodes including additions of 'Friday the 13th - The Series', 'Star Trek - The Next Generation' and 'Alfred Hitchcock Presents'.
