Tuesday, April 9, 2019

Pet Sematary II

Pet Sematary II (1992)

Runtime: 100 minutes

Directed by: Mary Lambert

Starring: Edward Furlong, Anthony Edwards, Clancy Brown, Jason McGuire, Darlanne Fluegel

From: Paramount

If you were bored by the remake of the '89 film, this may at least provide unintentional laughs: 

This movie did not make my shitlist.

II's reputation has never been great but I've heard some things about it-mainly Clancy Brown's performance-that make it seem like this was worth a shot. Turns out, the movie is oddly mean-spirited and cruel and yet... especially in the back half this is incredibly loony; technically this isn't good but Lord was it ever perversely entertaining to watch all the lunacy.

Edward Furlong has a famous scream queen mother... who dies on set in a hilarious accident, if I am being frank here. He and his vet dad (a bearded Anthony Edwards!) move to the same town in Maine that the first movie is set in, and once again more pets and humans end up in that ancient Indian burial ground and again we get chaos. Instead of being focused on death and grief-although those themes are still present-we get plenty of colorful moments, some of which are pretty brutal... for example, don't get too attached to the kittens or the rabbits you see; a definite Allison M. vegan warning, in other words.

Furlong's character ends up becoming best buds with chubby kid Drew. His stepdad is county sheriff Gus Gilbert, played to memorable effect by Clancy Brown. Gus is a terror and horrible human being, although amusingly so... and in the second half, he was amazingly over the top and great. Once the film gets going, wackiness and gonzo moments happen and I had fun. It goes off the rails in the final act; Many of the songs on the soundtrack are incredibly dated, although there was one from The Jesus and Mary Chain, another from Traci Lords (!) and in the true highlight, L7's Shitlist plays during a gruesome scene.

In tone and style this is far different from the original, but if you don't take it seriously and instead want to see what some would probably describe as “an Italian version of Pet Sematary”, this is worth a shot.

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