I spent every night of February 2017 reading from Stephen King’s novel IT.
It was the worst month of my life.
The book itself, lived up to the lofty praise I had seen over the years. I spent my most formative reading years devouring Stephen King’s long list of classics: The Shining, Christine, Kujo, the Dark Tower series … even my favorite (and one of his most personal pieces): On Writing. But, for some reason, I stayed far, far away from IT. Maybe it was the length of the book or just my early fear of clowns, but I never could convince myself to start it.
But there I was, over a decade later, February night after February night: finishing a chapter, turning off my light and then just staring at my bedroom ceiling for an hour, heart racing, jumping at every weird noise in my house.
The novel is a powerhouse of a book and, luckily, the movie turns its complex, long-winded storyline into a compelling, suspenseful, great film. The movie, which premiered this weekend and is currently (and unsurprisingly) dominating the box office, takes the best parts of the book (specifically, the friendship of the Losers’ Club and the genuine violence of the attacks) and turns them into a well-made horror flick.
Six months after finishing the book, I found myself right back into that same state of fear while watching the movie; my body slumping lower and lower into my theater chair, my left hand constantly blotting out half of the screen. Beginning with the first moments of the film, the iconic sewer scene, the tension of Pennywise and the brutality of his attacks never stops, evidenced by an early (and very bloody) shot of an armless Georgie. Looking back, I wish we had seen even more of Bill Skarsgård’s clown which, having to compare directly to Tim Curry’s 1990 performance, does an absolutely incredible job. His clown is truly, as it was in the books, an inter-dimensional terror pretending to be a clown, not necessarily just a scary clown. His alternating pitch and growling, animalistic saunter truly makes up one of the most unique horror monster portrayals in recent memory.
The aforementioned Losers’ Club was the other stand-out of the movie, with each member receiving a decent amount of attention and character building. The leader of the group, Bill Denbrough, played by Midnight Special’s Jaeden Lieberher, is believable in both the character’s best and worst moments, driven by the obsession to find the body of his “missing” brother. Stranger Things’ Finn Wolfhard plays the comedic relief of the group, believably acting the role of class clown, the glue that keeps the group sane through trauma.
People will compare this movie to Stranger Things and, besides the very obvious (Stranger Things taking huge amounts of inspiration from IT, almost directly lifting key characters and plot points, not vice versa), it is worth noting that this is very accessible horror, with minimal jump scares and gore, sacrificing the “torture porn” of the Saw franchise, for building suspense, great characters and Jordan-Peele-esque jokes.
In a year where movies like Get Out and The Shape of Water are getting significant Oscar Buzz, IT holds its own as one of the best horror movies (and movies, in general) of the year. As much of it as I could see through a small hole in between two of my fingers, anyway.
Take your kids.
Rating:
