Tag: Pet Sematary remake

Stephen Craig: “I loved the ending. It was campy, do you agree?”

Me: “Oh yeah, very…The ending was 3-D: dark, delicious, and ah geez, what was it, oh yeah, delightful!”

And indeed it is. We both loved how the script deviated from the original 1989 movie, which was excellent, by the way, but by having the daughter Rachael die and come back from the dead instead of the younger son, Gage, the tale veers off on a devilishly deviant tangent that ends in a sinister fashion (spoiler withheld).

Link to the review:

https://www.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3D_xQxJGaLnow

Here are my notes on the movie:

Starring Jason Clarke as Dr. Louis Creed, Jon Lithgow as neighbor Jud Crandall, and Jete’ Laurence as daughter Ellie, this is a spin of the classic “monkey’s paw” yarn that works beautifully. The tale explores the macabre, weighty but fascinating world of the death of loved ones and of our own mortality. PT is “smart zombie” tale, closer to vampires than George Romero’s mindless, human-flesh-eating obsessed undead. The beings that are resurrected from the special Micmac burial ground look like the original person or pet but harbor a hidden, evil streak poses lethal danger to the loved ones of the reanimated being.

I see that some critics say the pacing is too slow but I thought the pacing, with the exception of perhaps one too many flashbacks of the mother Rachael as a young child helping take care of her dying mother Zelda, was fine. It made the characters fully human and worth caring for. The only flaw worth noting is from the source material and the filmmakers failure to address it is the primary reason I can’t give this movie a perfect score. And that is the failure of the parents, after they move to an isolated home right by a busy road, to build some kind of protective fencing for their cat and young children. Other than that, I love how the new version of “Pet Sematary” keeps the parts of the original source material that do work and change the story from the younger Gage getting killed by a speeding semi to the older daughter Ellie.

As Jud says, “Sometimes dead is better” and I would amend that slightly to say that sometimes the original is story is fine but sometimes that are parts you should change. In this case, I think the producer and director made the right decision by having Ellie die and come back from the special burial ground.

I give it 9 kernels. Everything was perfect except for minor plot issues.

My co-host also gave it a 9.0. kernels out of 10.0. We talk about how fabulously Jon Lithgow as next-door neighbor, Jud Crandall, says the line, “Sometimes dead is better.” I add that Fred Gwynne (in the original) says it with more of an Eastern accent.

Seeing this wonderful flick inspired by Stephen King has me even more pumped up for the next, and final, “It” installment. It’s going to be released Sept. 5th, a day after my birthday. Bring it on, baby!