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I usually don't like kids in the movies all that much. Maybe I'm missing that maternal gene, or maybe I'm just not that into the little rugrats. But suffice to say that I sometimes have a pretty dark view of children, and that's why I love The Bad Seed -- and I especially love little Rhoda Penmark. The Bad Seed was based on William March's novel about a murderous little girl who terrorizes her family and friends, and by the time it's all said and done, she comes up with relatively respectable body count. The 1956 film was directed by Mervyn LeRoy and starred Patty McCormack as the pigtailed terror, and in spite of a tacked-on ending to satisfy the Hays code at the time, the film is still considered on of the penultimate 'creepy kid' flicks.

But what set Rhoda apart is that usually when you have murderous kids, the moral caveat is usually that they are outside the 'normal run of things', leaving our heroes to dispatch the bad guy without any hand-wringing about harming children. So most films give you kids like Damian (the Antichrist himself) or those creepy little buggers from Village of The Damned who come from another planet -- but with Rhoda, there is no one to blame but her. Although in both the film and the original book, there is an argument that she is just the victim of her family tree, but that's not exactly the same as the supernatural kids in those other horror films. There is no excuse for why Rhoda is the way she is, and she reminds you that evil can come in all kinds of packages -- and that's why to this day, the sight of her skipping away with her braids swinging remains as one of my most beloved movie villain moments.

After the jump; some of Rhoda's creepier moments and a tribute to her lasting inspiration to the macabre everywhere...

We've seen the ads, we've seen a trailer, but we really have no idea what to expect from this week's release of Gamer. Except that it's directed by Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor, the madmen of action cinema, and it's set in the near future, and it concerns an online game that involves mind control. Cool! If we're lucky, maybe we can figure out what's happening before a migraine sets in from all the on-screen insanity sure to be unleashed from the people behind Crank and Crank High Voltage.

Focusing on the mind control angle for a moment led me to think about all the great sci-fi movies that have played around with the idea of remote control mental gymnastics. The adolescent brain immediately seizes on the possibilities inherent in stripping unsuspecting young ladies down to the buff (thanks a lot, Zapped!), yet the more mature thinker wonders about deeper issues, like what to do with a woman who will only go out with you because you gave her no choice.

1. X-Men
Bryan Singer wove the mind control battle between Professor Charles Xavier (Patrick Stewart) and Magneto (Ian McKellan) into the fabric of the story. You could enjoy Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) discovering a fuller range of his powers, sympathize with the desperate plight of Rogue (Anna Paquin), admire Jean Grey (Famke Janssen), or simply try and stare through the body paint covering Mystique (Rebecca Romijn). Lurking in the background, though, was a duel between good and evil, with Professor Xavier favoring gentle nudges in the right direction and Magneto ready to wage an all-out war.

Read the Rest at SciFi Squad

Okay, so I've never been much for the company of kids. which may make me extra-susceptible when it comes to the evil deeds and manipulations of a perfectly precious child on-screen. It's an easy button to push, though -- after all, who would ever suspect, let alone harm a vengeful little moppet?

None of that appeal escapes tomorrow's release, Orphan, and it certainly isn't the first time that horror and horseplay have mixed on film. While I'm tempted to include that little girl from [REC] (and also Quarantine, I suppose) for giving me the willies, I won't because she wasn't the chief antagonist, and the only reason I'm leaving Children of the Corn off the list is, well, I haven't actually seen that yet. And although it doesn't hit Stateside shelves until this October, keep an eye out for the very tense import, The Children.

But worry not: even with the exceptions, there's certainly no shortage of other brats to choose from.

Everybody loves evil children! Judging from its trailer, the wide release of The Unborn this weekend promises to unleash a new terrifying tot upon a nation of unsuspecting teens. But the idea of scary juveniles extends far beyond the expected audience for David Goyer's jolt-fest.

One writer suggested that the idea of evil children originated "in the biblical tale of Elisha's mockery," in which 42 small boys disrespected a prophet of God -- and were promptly torn to pieces by two bears. The silver screen featured dozens of bratty kids in the 30s and 40s (e.g. the Dead End Kids/Bowery Boys) but none as murderously terrifying as 10-year-old Rhoda Penmark (Patty McCormack) in Mervyn LeRoy's The Bad Seed (1956), a rebel yell against a conformist generation of "perfect" suburban families.

The 50s also produced Jerome Bixby's short story "It's a Good Life," featuring a three-year-old with more super powers than anyone at Marvel or DC could dream up. First adopted as an episode of The Twilight Zone (with Billy Mummy), Joe Dante added layers of suburban subversion when he used it as the basis for his segment of Twilight Zone: The Movie (with Jeremy Licht as the kid).

Which tots, tykes, and teens have terrified you? Here's my personal countdown of evil children that have inspired nightmares or, at least, made me shiver.

7. Darby O'Gill and the Little People

I was five or six years old and had never seen little people before -- I freaked out because I couldn't understand why kids my age had wrinkles and beards, and were dancing and drinking liquids my Dad said never to touch. The wailing banshee gave me nightmares, but those little people made my hair stand up.

With this weekend's The Day the Earth Stood Still, Hollywood continues its attempt to remake every remotely viable classic property it can get its hands on. (It also conjures up the perfect role for Keanu Reeves, but that's another post.) The science-fiction genre has been a particularly inviting target, which makes sense since the ability to use modern effects makes filmmakers think that they are improving on their source material regardless of whether that's actually true. But it hasn't been all bad. Hollywood still churns out some good sci-fi from time to time, and some of the remakes have hit their mark. Here's a list of seven that worked for me -- though I warn you that my tastes in genre films are somewhat idiosyncratic. I'm fond of some black sheep.

1. War of the Worlds (2005) - Some of you may want to get off the train right here. But I saw Spielberg's War of the Worlds before the bad buzz, and I found the first ninety minutes just ridiculously intense -- the realest alien invasion ever put on screen. This was Spielberg the wizard, the technician, in top form. Sure, he chose to play out his daddy issues instead of giving us a believable ending; everyone is right about that. But to me, that's barely a smudge on this movie's accomplishments.