This year we have been plagued/amused by a series of clowns in the media. From creepy pranks to the promos for IT and the new season of American Horror Story, these fuckers are everywhere.
Despite it all, we still love them or hate them or if you’re like me…annoyed by them. Today I’m reviewing IT. Ok know I said I would get this review out sooner but I fuckin’ lied… Shoot me! No just kidding. I’ve been swamped with a few new projects-a-brewing.
And come October I will be unveiling Horror Media countdown to Halloween & finally my vlogs, which will link directly to my YouTube channel & social media pages!
That being said here are my very late takes on the 2017 release of IT which opened in theaters Friday Sept 8th.
What can I say, I loved this movie! I actually saw it twice! As a horror buff and Stephen King fan, I went in in meh expectations… because I’ve seen King adaptions and they either fly or fail…always feast or famine with the source material & very little room for gray area. Case in point:
We had Misery, which was awesome. Who didn’t fear and love Kathy Bates yet feel sorry for James Caan?
And then we had
(sigh)… Sleepwalkers, which I won’t lie, I secretly liked nonetheless but I won’t go into why but just Google the end credit score.
But despite all of that, I had this surging excitement brewing deep at the core. I was ready to see what the hype was all about! First off, The Losers club was cast carefully and excellently. I felt the connection between both the book as well the 90 miniseries. This movie had enough comical, scary & dramatic elements, especially since contains teen actors, which you don’t see acting like adults. These are kids with some fucked up issues.
I even like the changes such as changing the setting from the 50s to the 80s without trying and failing to incorporate every detail in the updated reboot. If you’re a fan like myself, you will notice the Easter eggs from the source material. From Ben’s bike, Silver to the Lego turtle in Georgie’s room to the “Tim Curry” version of Pennywise in the house on Neibolt St.
IT pays homage to both the 1990 miniseries and book very well. I won’t dive into that too deeply since everyone has probably already seen IT already.
Which brings me to the topic at hand, Pennywise…
Played this time around by Bill Skarsgärd, who I enjoyed watching.
What I like about the 2017 Pennywise is that it stands alone from the 1990 version. Both are amazingly done, although Tim Curry will always be my fav. That being said… They took the character and gave it a completely different visual appeal. Much like the way Heath Ledger did with Dark Knight version of the Joker, which didn’t try to mimic the awesome Jack Nicholson… Skarsgärd does something fresh and creepy with Pennywise. What made me really happy was unlike the miniseries, they didn’t fully rely on Pennywise to scare the Losers. In the book, everyone has a different fear that terrorizes them in which IT uses to feed on because we’ll it’s like “seasoning the meat”. Despite Pennywise being his fav “skin” the alien likes to sport, we still see more than just the clown in the entire film. I’m guessing because they had a little more wiggle room being made for a R-rated release instead of TV miniseries. Heaven only knows that ABC (known for sitcoms in my day) had their work cut out for them trying to “PG” Stephen King back then. Which makes makes me respect Curry all the more…he managed to twist folks’ love for clowns all the while being edited for television.
That being said all the hype in the last year, all the creepy clown sightings have hyped you or scared you but was a great preparation for IT and I am stoked to see the next chapter when the Losers are grown. All in all, IT was awesome.
If you haven’t seen it by now, check it out.
Well til next time kiddies…
Shalom
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