This is the first film based on the novel written by Stephen King in 1983. This was released just in time to be in the class in the eighties horror movie group being released in 1989. It cost $11.5m to produce and went on to make $57.5m at the box-office. Which back in the 80’s is a sizeable profit and assisted Stephen King to become the King of Horror and began his love affair with movies and his writing. This movie stars Dale Midkiff, Fred Gwynne, Denise Crosby, Brad Greenquist, Michael Lombard, Miko Hughes & Blaze Berdahl. I am tempted to dive straight into the plot here, so I will.
The story is based on the Creed family Louis and Rachel and their children Ellie and toddler Gage and let’s not forget the cat Church. They are moving which is where so many horror movies begin, this family are moving from Chicago to Ludlow, Maine. Maine is where many of King’s stories are based, this is a rural area where Louis is medical officer at the local University and on his first day there, he encounters Victor Pascow a jogger who is hit by a truck. Desperate to save Victor Louis does his best but is unable to save him. Never fear Victor will come back as a ghost and a mentor to Louis to help advise him to avoid the cemetery. They make friends with a neighbour Jud Crandall who has been here for years he is alone after the death of his wife. Despite being in the middle of woodlands the house is passed regularly by these big trucks going to and from the only factory in town. This is all foreboding for the viewers. Jud explains how things used to be and becomes a bit of a mentor for Louis. During Thanksgiving with the family and Jud celebrate together Ellie’s cat Church joins many other wild victims of the trucks and is run over. Ellie doesn’t know and Jud gives Louis another option. So, they travel past the Pet Sematary that has many pets buried including Jud’s and they go into the woods and beyond the woods to find an Indian burial ground deep in the woods. Louis is forced to bury the cat alone without the assistance of Jud. They return and the next day Church returns walking around like nothing was wrong in the first place. Church is back but he is not the way he used to be, he is nasty and not friendly at all. He’ll scratch your hand if you try to pet him and bite you without giving it a second thought. With this knowledge of bringing animals back he continues life with his family and then you can guess it but his son gets hit by a truck and killed. To cope with the death his wife and daughter go and visit grandparents and leave him alone at the home. Knowing his grave is nearby and the way to bring him back is also nearby. What could possibly go wrong with this theory.
Lots of plot for you there and enough to hopefully help you decide if you want to go and see this movie. They have made a remake or they have remade Pet Sematary again in the last year or two with the odd twist here and there. I went to the cinema to see it and I will keep with the original one thanks. There was also a sequel to this movie with Pet Sematary 2 which I implore you to avoid and save yourself an hour and half of your life. It’s worth it. Anyway, this is the movie I am reviewing and I gave it 75% which other critics did not agree with the two others gave this a 6.6/10 from IMDb but a low 51% from Rotten Tomatoes. I gave this a higher score because it deserves it. This is a better interpretation of the book than the new slow and dragging new version. The new version gets a lower score from IMDb but the Tomatoes gave the new one a higher score compared to this one. For me this is a naturally slow story building steadily with spooky and scary bits dotted throughout until the end where the brown stuff hits the fan and the story comes to a conclusion. There was one scene that will live forever with me as it was gory and made me go eeewww and the new one tried to the same and wasn’t as good. Now the casting of Jud was perfect in this version and pretty damn good in the new one as well. The rest of the detail was not however. This is a scary spooky gory and shocking movie which is what a horror movie should be and it does it well using eighties technology and works well.
You know what I forgot the one thing I was going to mention about this movie and the scariest and spookiest bit as well and that is the wife's sister that haunts her dreams, never mind the bloody cat her sister scared the cr*p out of me when I was a kid, truly terrified!!
But if you have a choice of new or old to watch then old wins for me by a mile. But never ever give number 2 the time of day.
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