Clown In a Cornfield 4: Lights! Camera! Frendo!
Clown In a Cornfield 4: Lights! Camera! Frendo! by Adam Cesare
Three weeks ago, Fulton, Missouri
Andy Sims is startled awake in the middle of the night by goddamn shit fucking kids. At least he assumes it's the kids, or actually teenagers, being idiots. He grabs his shotgun, loaded with non-lethal birdshot, and goes outside to investigate his farm. Things aren't going so well for Andy. His wife has left him, the farm isn't doing well, the jerk teens keep spooking his cows so they won't produce milk, and a movie production company wants to buy his barn, not his farm, not his house, not his cows, just the barn. He has refused to sell, where will his cows sleep if he loses the barn? Outside, he sees his cows where they shouldn't be and a man standing in the distance inside the pen. No, not a man. A clown. Andy shoots at his feet and then, moving inside the pen himself, realizes it's a scarecrow. A stupid prank. And then he's zapped with a cattle prod. Again. And again. And then the cows are prodded, too. And then Andy is trampled to death.
Now, St. Louis, Missouri
Jerri Shaw has just finished her first professional, or at least semi-professional, DJ gig. Her school therapist and also Mayor Maybrook were worried that DJing would cause Jerri to have traumatic flashbacks to the barn party she DJed when she was in middle school that became known as the Kettle Springs Massacre. Nope. She did fine. Just fine. Cole and Rust are on their way to the club to pick her up, but as Jerri waits in the alley, she overhears a woman saying no to a persistent man. Jerri has practiced a million times what to do in this situation in Rust’s self-defense lessons and steps in to defend the woman with pepper spray. The woman kicks the man while he's down and thanks… oh my god, Quinn Maybrook?! No. No. Quinn is dead. Jerri was there though. Jerri survived the massacre and the riot the following year, too. Cole and Rust finally arrive to pick Jerri up.
Now, Kettle Springs, Missouri
Quinn Maybrook, actually Sabrina Alvarez, is in a van, getting ever nearer to Kettle Springs to begin filming for the upcoming movie Clown In a Cornfield (ridiculous name surely to be changed before release). She is, as in the articles she's read, a nobody, but she auditioned and earned her role with legendary and just plain weird director DFH, David Frank Hansen, fair and square. Two other actors in the van, mid-to-upper-twenties “teenage” actor Joseph Nyack, playing Cole, and mean girl Francesca Dodd, playing Janet, are more famous and thus bitchier than Sabrina is. Luckily, the other actor, Dylan Reeves, a real, serious actor, who looks a lot more like Cole than Joseph does, stands up for Sabrina. He's playing Matthew, a kid who was actually in on the massacre, but just has a small part in this movie.
Cole Hill greets the actors as they get off the van. It’s been an unknowable amount of weeks since he was doing this same thing with the orphaned kids arriving from New Kettle Springs, aka the creepy religious cult town from Clown 3. A few crew teams have already arrived as well as a handful of the other actors that will be playing Cole’s murdered friends, and now, since he's a producer, he's greeting this round of actors. He is none too pleased with Joseph Nyack who is playing him but doesn't really look like him much at all, and Francesca who just seems like a self-important bitch, but Sabrina as Quinn, even though they don't really look too much alike, seems perfect for the role of Cole’s now dead best friend. Sabrina turns to introduce Cole to Dylan, who will be playing Matt, and Cole is excited to meet him, but no, he's decided to continue on foot to the motel where the cast and crew are all staying. He's already been in town before but Cole still hasn't had the chance to meet him.
Jerri is taking notes in a meeting with Mayor Maybrook and a teamster who works for the production company of Clown In a Cornfield. He's upset that the signs directing his crew through the small, redneck streets of Kettle Springs have started disappearing. Mayor Maybrook thinks maybe local nuisance Kalvin Marsh is responsible because a lot of the older locals, Kalvin included, are not super pleased with filming taking place in their town, what with nearly all the adults literally massacring nearly all the teens just a couple of years ago. It's not a good look. The teamster suggests arresting the guy with literally no evidence and quite a bit of violence. Acting sheriff Ruston Vance suggests maybe he should arrest the teamster for inciting violence? Maybe something else? This shuts the teamster up, though he's still unhappy. Rust, though good at this job, isn't super happy either, mostly because people keep insisting he's the Sheriff, not just acting as a placeholder in that position for the time being.
Rust gets a call about a fire from Deputy Parson and he and Mayor Maybrook go check it out. There's a dead body at the scene, which immediately makes Rust think murders and clowns. This seems to be an accidental death though. A local homeless man seems to have died, likely, Mayor Maybrook says, drawing on his former doctor skills, after starting a fire to keep warm after coming down from an overdose. They notice the person had built his shelter using signs from the movie. So it's not Kalvin after all. And it's not a murder. OR IS IT?!!
DFH asks Sabrina to meet in the motel gym, aka the weird storage space they just recently converted, and wants her to start crossfit training to bulk up and slim down for the movie, but not in an eating-disordery way, in a Sarah Connor way, just so we're clear. After screaming and grunting her way through her exercises, Sabrina realizes someone is watching her. A clown. Oh wait, it's just Joseph. He lets her know they could all hear her grunting and then invites her to come drink with the rest of the cast, but she says no. Dylan shows up then, telling them they have an early call tomorrow and everyone will be on set, making Joseph leave so Sabrina can finish up her exercises. He has been through what Sabrina is going through now with the crossfit, so he tells her she should get back to it.
Jerri and Cole are at the shoot the next day and all the actors playing their friends are there. Jerri is mesmerized by Kaitlyn Albright, the first Assistant Director, and decides maybe that's who she wants to be when she grows up. Sabrina, Joseph, Francesca, Dylan, and a few others, Sade, Jean and Marshall, are shooting a scene where Quinn meets Cole and Rust's friends for the first time. It's a nothing scene and Cole is getting annoyed by DFH’s constant retakes. DFH takes Cole's phone, which is forbidden on set, and throws it into the field, yelling at him. Kaitlyn quietly tells him that DFH will apologize later but needed to make an example out of someone to put the fear into the actors, and it works. The next take is perfect.
Up next is an action sequence. Sabrina will be chased by a Frendo with a chainsaw on a moving 18-wheeler and has to jump from the trailer to the cab. It's terrifying but she does it herself, no stunt double. After the scene is shot, they realize that her safety cable has been cut. She just did a literal life and death jump and survived. DFH calls her John McClane but then tells everyone to shut up about it because what they just did was illegal as shit… but it was badass!
Iris Schmidt used to own and operate a deli with her husband Clay, but he's been gone for some time. Iris is happy to be working again, making sandwiches again, as part of the craft services crew on the movie. She's not like the other people in town who are angry about the movie being filmed and is happy to work again. She has prepared so many delicious sandwiches for the crew but then the yelling and vomiting starts. Rats. There are rats in the sandwiches! The crew angrily yells about the fucking townies ruining everything, but Iris just wanted to help. Unfortunately, she crumples to the ground and dies of a heart attack.
Rust goes to Kalvin's house alone, Parson constantly talking to him over the radio. It's not a good idea that he's going without backup, but there's only Parson and another officer called Billy that work in Kettle Springs and Billy's currently on the opposite shift from Rust, so he can't call him and it would take forever for officers from the next town over to come help. Rust needs to investigate and make sure Kalvin wasn't responsible for the rat sandwiches. Kalvin's door is ajar when Rust arrives, so he loudly announces himself and enters. He is certain he's going to get shot because Kalvin is the kind of guy who seems to want to die by cop someday. Kalvin's house is a mess and there are mouse traps all over. Was he really responsible for the rats? Rust finds Kalvin coming out of the bathroom with his shotgun pointed right at him, Parson trying to get his attention over the radio. After Kalvin lowers his gun, Rust hears Parson say that he and Kalvin went bowling together the night before, so he couldn't be the guy behind the rats. Rust apologizes and leaves.
The next day, Sabrina stays late after filming to get a couple of extra shots and goes to lunch at a small cafe in town. The craft services crew was given the day off after the nightmare of the rat sandwiches the day before and everyone was given a per diem to pay for food. Sabrina wanted to experience the town and chose the cafe, but she really seems unwelcome or unwanted by her server, an older lady called Trish. As she eats lunch, Sabrina talks to her mom who is pretty pushy about not being on set with her, but Sabrina is 18 now and no longer needs a chaperone. The lunch isn't great and neither is the conversation, but Sabrina leaves her entire per diem to pay, thinking the town needs the money more than she does.
Jean is covered in corn syrup blood, his part in the film almost done. Just this last scene and he can go back home to Canada. After holding his death pose for entirely too long, he's finally allowed to move, to get cleaned up and head to the airport and get the hell out of Kettle Springs. As he watches the corn speed by outside the windows of the SUV taking him to the airport, he suddenly notices the vehicle slowing to a stop and then hears a voice, garbled by a voice changing device, telling him to get out and that he's being given a head start. The voice belongs to Frendo the Clown. Jean runs into the corn but Frendo catches up, smashing his head in with a rock and burying him deep in the soil of the field so the vultures can't get him.
Jerri, now acting as a Production Assistant, even though she's not, is tasked with delivering the call sheets and scripts to the actors’ rooms for their next shoot, and she runs into Sabrina. Sabrina recognizes Jerri, not as a PA, which she knows she's not, and not as Cole Hill’s assistant, which she mostly kind of is, but as the DJ the night of the massacre. She gets upset then that DFH has cast a boy in the role for the movie and says she'll talk to him about it, but Jerri asks her not to. She then compliments Sabrina on how strong she is, but not just physically. She thinks Quinn would approve.
Sabrina continues on to her room, eager to get out of her sweaty exercise clothes and into the shower so she can start work on her lines for the next day. Unfortunately, there is someone inside her room. Sabrina freaks out but then she realizes it's just Dylan. He apologizes profusely, not expecting her to have stripped immediately out of her shirt. She demands to know how he got in her room and he explains that he learns a skill on the set of each movie he's in and in a previous one, he learned how to pick locks. He thought Sabrina would think it was funny to find him sitting in her room with the bag he carries with him everywhere but… bad idea. She asks about the bag and learns that he's working on his own movie and has his laptop with him at all times, but talk quickly changes to kissing, something she's always dreamed about, even practicing with the posters on her bedroom wall. They move to the bed, but then a brick is thrown through the window with a note written in magazine letters telling her she's going to die in that field. Yikes.
Cole has a nightmare and wakes in the bed he shares with Rust in Rust's family home. Rust is on patrol but will be coming with him that night when they start their night shoots. Rust's dad, Jim, checks in on Cole, making sure he's okay. He's a doomsday prepper and a veteran, so he understands the nightmares that Cole has and offers to go with him to the barn where they will be filming the worst part of the massacre, but Cole assures him that Rust will be with him and will keep him safe. Jim asks that Cole keep Rust safe, too.
Jerri is Cole's assistant, the Mayor's assistant, she runs the movie theater and is now apparently a PA. She's looking for notes from an earlier production meeting to share with the mayor, who doesn't want to be on set at all, and with Cole, who, after the phone throwing incident, is only around every few days. She overhears a conversation between Kaitlyn and DFH that she probably isn't supposed to hear about the farmer not answering Kaitlyn when she asked about using power from his house at the farm. He hasn't responded to calls or emails and they need him to agree or production will be delayed. DFH makes a call pretending to be the farmer allowing access and that's when Jerri knocks stuff over, accidentally making herself known. When she explains that she only heard DFH do what he needs to do to keep the film going, he gives her a promotion.
Billy, the other police officer in Kettle Springs, has just switched shifts with Rust and the very first thing he has to deal with is Parson calling him to investigate a dead body in the reservoir. He goes, hoping it will just be a prank. It is, but it's not a ha-ha prank. As he investigates, Billy encounters Frendo the Clown and he thinks he recognizes the person beneath the mask. Too bad he gets shot and falls dead into the reservoir before he can do anything about it. See? There is a body in there. Not a prank call.
Sabrina, Dylan, Sade, Joseph and Marshall are on their way to the farm for the last bit of shooting, Sabrina and Dylan sitting together in the van after their brief makeout session a couple of days ago before the menacing brick message. Sabrina likes to think she's gotten Dylan to open up a little since she's the star of the movie. They talk about how Janet, the character that Francesca is playing, actually died in real life, not in the way they're about to film, and Dylan tries to stop Joseph from being a dick about it, but he's always a dick. They wonder where Francesca is, but assume she's already on set.
Assistant to the Assistant Director Jerri is with Kaitlyn at the farm. Kaitlyn takes her inside where she sees almost the exact same DJ booth set up she used the night of the massacre. Kaitlyn asks her if it looks right and doesn't realize how insensitive she is until she sees Jerri with tears streaming down her face. No, no, it's fine, just need to switch a couple of cables and it will be perfect. Jerri remembers hiding underneath the booth, too scared to move to unplug the speakers so everyone could hear what was going on around them. Maybe if she had, things would have turned out differently.
CJ, a stuntman, is getting ready for the last week of filming and he's happy it's almost done since he definitely has some cracked ribs after a bad shot with one of the teens in the movie. He wraps his ribs and slowly pulls the Frendo suit up. When he pulls the mask on, suddenly, someone grabs him from behind, hand over his mouth. At first he thinks it's a prank by the other stunt guys, but when they hit him with a sledgehammer, he realizes it's not. The other Frendos, not stuntmen, pull him out of his costume and mask and hit him one last time in the head with the hammer.
Cole and Rust are about to pull up to the farm. Technically it's not the farm but it looks enough like it to freak both of them out, even though they don't say that out loud. Rust’s phone has been ringing a lot but he's not on duty and doesn't want to answer the phone, knowing something bad must be happening in Kettle Springs. He wants to be there with Cole. Just as Cole talks to Jerri, he tells Rust to answer the phone because he's not going to be a good body guard on set if he's constantly worried about what's going on. Parson tells Rust he can't get in touch with Billy and he doesn't know what to do. Rust tells him to call the next town's officers and that he's on his way back.
Sabrina is getting ready for her next scene, a POV switch of her running like Tom Cruise after Francesca, as Janet, screams There's more than one clown! and violently dies. In the first take, Frendo stunt person CJ trips over their shoes and DFH yells at them, and the rest of the Frendos, and then they reset. The second take is much better and Francesca really seems to be putting it all out there with her death screams. Sabrina runs Tom Cruisily and the shot is complete. They're going to do another take, of course, but then they realize that Francesca isn't getting up. Oh shit. She's actually dead. And then the Frendos start killing everyone. Joseph gets stabbed in the belly with a knife. Marshall's head is exploded with a shotgun. Sabrina, Dylan and Sade run.
Rust can't get in touch with Billy or Parson, but then Parson finally responds. Rust is on his way back to the station to get some official police gear but Parson tells him he needs to go to the reservoir where Billy was supposed to be. Rust arrives at the station to find not Parson, where he's supposed to be, but Parson's cell phone on speaker next to the radio that is rubber banded in the on position. Rust asks what's going on only to find that Parson has sent him on a wild goose chase, keeping him away from the film set. Parson is there of course. Has been for the past little while. By the time Rust makes it back, he can be the first officer on the scene and can identify Cole's dead body. Rust decides not to use official police gear after all. He's using his own guns.
Cole and Jerri realize what's happening at about the same time, but when Cole wants to run away, Jerri rushes toward Kaitlyn and yells for everyone to run because it's real. Cole watches a Frendo put on a hidden flamethrower and realizes all of this has been planned. The Flamethrower Frendo blasts the tent where DFH was watching all his cameras, getting ready for the scene reset. Someone comes out, flailing in flames. Maybe if DFH is dead, the Frendos will stop? No. Not so lucky. Several more gunshots go off and then Jerri and Kaitlyn are limping toward Cole. He realizes Kaitlyn has been shot. They see other crew running away toward the road and several of them go down, too. The only choice they have is to go into the corn. Maybe Cole will be able to get a signal and call for help.
Sabrina, Dylan and Sade get far enough away from the Frendos, but Sade was hurt before they took off. They stop to check her wound and it's pretty bad. Her neck was sawed with a serrated blade. Dylan worries about her slowing them down if she tries to run more on her own, but she won't have it. They gather some broken, naily boards to use as weapons and not long later, Sabrina ends up killing a Frendo with a board to the head. They escape into the corn, but then Sade disappears. The Frendos dug pit traps and she fell into one and was impaled.
Cole manages a call to 911 and the dispatcher lets him know that she's been told to expect prank calls tonight and doesn't take him seriously. He tries to get through to her and she says she'll send help, but will she? After the phone call, they do a weapons check. Jerri has a baton just like Quinn used to use, which makes her and Cole a little sentimental, but not for long. A body comes rushing at them and Jerri cracks them in the face. Too late do they realize it's DFH. Kaitlyn hugs him and he demands to use Cole's phone to call for help, but they've already done that. Hopefully Rust will find them.
Sabrina and Dylan hear Frendos coming near them in the corn and hide. They overhear them talking on a radio to someone called Red Leader, telling him that they haven't seen anyone lately, and no cops seem to be on the way, but then they hear someone or something else and walk away. Sabrina kisses Dylan after they leave, but now is not the time for that. They decide to go the opposite way, right into the Flamethrower Frendo. He lets off a burst of fire and then Sabrina bashes him with her nail board. She doesn't hit him and he gets all cocky about killing her being nearly like killing Quinn would be, but then he realizes that his flamethrower tank is leaking diesel… and then he explodes. Sabrina only catches on fire a little bit and then she tries to find Dylan, but he's nowhere to be seen.
Cole, Jerri, Kaitlyn and DFH try to find help or safety and follow a really really bad smell, hoping for a sewage plant or rendering farm or something. Instead, they find a hastily constructed pen holding the dairy cows from the farm that DFH supposedly had moved to safety so they could film, but the cows are all dead and decomposing. Kaitlyn yells at DFH because he always pulls some shit like this and then she becomes unhinged, thinking that DFH has planned a secret twist to the movie that he's filming right now, found-footage style. She thinks he's in on the whole thing and they yell at each other until a Frendo shoots a crossbow bolt into Kaitlyn’s eye. Cole and Jerri head into the cow carcasses and the Frendo pins DFH still with a bolt, not finished with him yet. The Frendo follows Cole and Jerri but Jerri still has her baton. They team up and kill the crossbow Frendo.
Ben, the fire chief of Kettle Springs, has been friends with Kalvin since they were kids, which is how he found himself wearing a Frendo suit, killing the movie and everyone on set. Ben thought they were just going to scare people, not actually kill anyone, but then Kalvin starts going off about conspiracy theories. Ben questions if they are killing people because they put DEI into the movie and Kalvin says no, but then goes off about boys kissing and the movie making everyone in Kettle Springs look stupid. Ben asks if they should contact Parson, Red Leader, but then they run into another Frendo. Ben doesn't really know any of the extra people Kalvin found on the Internet, and it seems like maybe Kalvin doesn't know this Frendo either. This one is wearing a classic Frendo mask, not one of the ones made for the movie like everyone else is wearing. And then this Frendo kills both Kalvin and Ben.
Sabrina finds DFH and tries to help him up, but he's crossbow bolted down and probably dying. Cole and Jerri come out of the cow carcasses and then Dylan shows up, too. Sabrina kisses him and then they try to figure out how many Frendos are left. Dylan reveals he killed two and Sabrina killed two as well, so there can't be that many left. Were there six to start with? Is there only one left? DFH says that there's always more, there's always a third act reveal, and then the third act reveal reveals itself. It's Dylan. Inside the computer bag he's been carrying the entire time is a classic Frendo mask and a big knife, which he plunges into DFH's head. Cole has Crossbow Frendo’s crossbow but is having trouble loading it. Dylan cackles and runs off, telling them that he's going to kill them all.
Rust arrives at the farm, guns loaded, to find absolute destruction. He finds a dead Frendo with a radio clipped to his belt and starts listening, looking all around. He thinks he spots movement in the farmhouse and then he hears people on the radio. A Frendo says he thinks he's the only one left and thinks pretty much all of their targets are dead and Red Leader, Parson, Rust knows, responds that he's got his sights on Cole and two girls, well one girl and one half girl, he says. And then he shoots and says he's taken care of the rich boy. He also says he knows that Rust is listening. Rust knows he's inside the house, that's where the gun just shot from, so he enters. Parson starts talking to Rust like he's a good cop and is going to arrest him. Nope. You said you just killed Cole. Rust shoots him three times, and then eleven more for good measure.
Cole, Sabrina and Jerri are trying to find Dylan and then they do. Cole runs off, trying to get Dylan to follow him, but he goes after Jerri instead, stabbing her. Sabrina tries to fight him off and he slashes her arm with his knife, taunting her about wanting to be a star-fucker and having no friends and then his head explodes. Oh thank fuck. Not Cole then, just his lookalike and extra crazy murderer.
But then a Frendo with a chainsaw arrives. This is the sixth one. He comes at Sabrina and Jerri, and then is hit with a crossbow bolt. Cole got him. He comes to the girls and they hear a voice on chainsaw Frendo's radio. It's Rust. He tells them he's got an eye on them and that they're safe now, asking if there are any more Frendos. They think that's all of them, but then a thresher comes driving at them through the corn. It's Trish, the bitchy waitress from the restaurant, and she has painted her face like Frendo. Sabrina lifts Jerri and they run, and then Sabrina tells Jerri she's going to throw her out of the path of the giant machine. Rust gets a shot off, stopping the momentum of the machine, but not its blades. Sabrina grabs the woman's legs and yanks her into the thresher. Finally the cops show up, which must mean it's finally the end.
Six months after the original Clown In a Cornfield movie was supposed to be released, the redone one came to theaters. A lot of it was reshot and there were new actors hired and it was filmed at a completely different location, somewhere in Canada, not on location in Kettle Springs. Quinn Maybrook, the real one, the real living one, watches the movie and decides that making it probably wasn't worth it. At the end of the movie, she uses the restroom. She's got a long way to go before she gets home.
