Pet Sematary is the first Stephen King novel i ever read when I was 12. I definitely loved it and thought it was really scary, though when I read it the second time a few years later, I realized how sad and depressing the novel is, more than anything. A lot of King's stories are sad underneath the horror, but this one is particularly heavy. I always enjoyed the first Pet Sematary movie too, even though a lot of people don't like it. I think it captured the creepiness of the book, and the actors did a good job with their roles, especially Miko Hughes as Gage (that's a difficult role to play for an adult, and Hughes was a little kid). I was excited to see what the filmmakers would do with the story in this reboot, and it got some mixed reviews, but I was still excited to check it out today.
This movie is about a family that moves from a larger city to a small town in the boonies. The dad is a doctor, and his wife stays home and takes care of their two kids, Ellie who is 9, and Gage who is 2. Besides adjusting to small-town life, they discover they have a creepy burial ground for pets on the edge of their property, the local kids have dubbed it the "Pet Sematary." When Ellie's cat gets hit by a car, their new neighbor Judd introduces the dad to another burial ground beyond the boarders of the "Pet Sematary," where dead things that are buried don't stay dead. Soon the evil of the place starts seeping in, corrupting the family. Will the doctor be able to stop the evil before it takes everything he loves?
Every time I encounter this story, whether reading the book or watching the movie, I get pissed at the dad for being so stupid (the wife too, honestly). They know their house is right next to a busy road where semi trucks go rocketing past at top speeds, but they don't bother to build a goddamn fence? Seriously? That would be the first thing I would do, and then the book would be ten pages long, because none of the rest of the story would happen..to be fair though, part of the reason I've always been so paranoid about kids getting hit by cars is because I read this book at a young age, and the characters in the book never had that chance. It's just so sad to me, how the crushing weight of grief must be even worse if you're a parent because you can't protect your kids from the dangers in the world, not even from a speeding truck.
At first I didn't really like the dad in this version of the story. He seems like kind of an arrogant jerk to me. I wound up feeling bad for him, though. It's hard not to after everything he goes through. And I definitely like his wife better in this version of the movie than in the original movie (or even the book). This movie does change some aspects of the story, and that pissed off a lot of viewers, but I almost think the story flows better with this change. Everything that happens seems to surround Ellie: she finds the Pet Sematary, she befriends Judd, it's her cat that gets hit by the car. I guess I don't mind changes to the story if they fit with the rest of the plot as well as they do in this movie.
There's a good spooky atmosphere in this movie. It doesn't have that tinge of 80s cheesiness like the original movie does. I like me some good 80s cheese, but the movie does seem darker without it. I also feel more desperation from the dad in this movie. I don't think he thought beyond his grief to what would happen after he does the terrible thing he's considering. This movie gives us more of a glimpse into exactly what DOES happen, after showing us that the dead things that get buried in that place don't come back the same...they're meaner and more violent and terrifying.
Getting to see more of that interaction drives the horror home deeper for me. Like "The Monkey's Paw," if the story didn't end before the family got to meet the son they brought back from the dead, if the got to see how twisted and evil he'd become, how everything sweet they loved about him was corrupted in the monster they brought back. The horror in the book and original movie is quieter, more hidden in the shadows and left to our imagination, while this movie blasts us in the face with it. I don't mind it, but I do get why people didn't like it. It's more over-the-top for sure. And if you wanted to rip your hair out because in the original story, the dad kept trying to use the ancient burial ground even after evidence that it ends with horror and evil, this movie even changes that aspect. I'm not sure how I felt about that twist, but the final shot in the movie is really creepy and cool, no matter how we get there. Overall, this movie was different, but I did enjoy it. It's worth checking out.
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