Runtime: 101 minutes
Directed by: Kevin
Kolsch/Dennis Widmeyer
Starring: Jason Clarke,
Amy Seimetz, Jete Laurence, John Lithgow
From: Paramount
The climax to this dark, serious horror film almost made me literally laugh out loud a few times...
As I mentioned in the review to my original Pet Sematary, I've never read the Stephen King novel. I did hear that the second trailer to this revealed a big change, and I was hoping to avoid viewing it, and I was ALMOST successful... even after that came out, I only saw the original trailer and this scenario was A-OK with me. Then it played last month when I was at a screening, and I was all “Damn it!” because being surprised by this would have been far preferable.
I won't recap the plot again, except that there is at least one big change from the '89 film and the novel. I know some things were added that were part of the book and weren't in '89, yet when the story itself is different from the original work, of course some will be up in arms concerning those choices. As a few have noted already, this has a more breakneck pace than the original, which means that some moments were left out and I wish they wouldn't have been as it probably would have helped in the storytelling department. And I won't reveal why the last 5 or so minutes of this film made me laugh.
This was more creepy than scary, although I was glad that it was not cheap jumpscare-heavy, although yes some jumpscares are present. If you can see this in an auditorium that has a Dolby Atmost setup (such as a Dolby Cinema at AMC, which is how I viewed this) then you will note how the sound mix was well-done with sound coming from all over the place, including the speakers above you. PS '89 isn't a masterpiece so I was not offended that there was a remake and it is lamentable how this has different strengths and weaknesses to '89 and thus I can't say this was any better or worse overall. At least I can praise the acting and how as a whole, it was better than in the original film. Jason Clarke, Amy Seimetz, Jete Laurence, & John Lithgow all deliver quality performances, and even the twins who played Gage was fine.
I did not love the previous film from directors Kevin Kolsch & Dennis Widmeyer (Starry Eyes) although it wasn't due to their direction and not the performance of star Alex Essoe-it was the nonsense storytelling-and while this could have been better if it wouldn't have gone in those silly directions, at least this wasn't yet another aggravating or worthless remake.
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