The new screen-play adaption of Stephen King’s 1983 book “Pet Sematary" detours from the original story-line, and it works!
The new “Pet Sematary,” like the book is about a married couple who move from Boston to a rural area of Maine. Unlike the book, in this month’s movie, the couple, Mr. and Mrs. Jason and Rachel Creed have two children, not just their 2-year-old boy, Gage. In the new “Pet Sematary,” the Creed’s also have an older daughter, Ellie, marvelously portrayed by Jete’ Laurence.
The theme for both the 1989 “Pet Sematary” and this year’s movie, along with the book remain the same. Death, would it be a good thing if we had the power to revive the recently deceased?
In the new “Pet Sematary,” the Creeds also have a cat named Church, short for Winston Churchill, and the burial ground for pets, the Pet Sematary is in their very large back yard which resides in the woods. The added character Ellie, who is still in elementary school, is the one who points out that sematary is spelled cemetery.
“Pet Sematary” is a great movie to watch for any fan of horror flicks. Spoiler alerts coming in the next few sentences, so if you want to see “Pet Sematary,” with complete surprise, don’t read the following paragraph. No spoilers in the last paragraph.
Like all the other “Pet Sematary’s,” the cat Church is the first to die and be buried in the grounds of the pet sematary and come back to life meaner and less attractive. Ellie is the next to die in a horrible accident, and her father Jason buries her in the sacred sematary while his wife and son Gage are out of town. Before Ellie’s death, she was a cute intelligent girl. Upon being risen from death, her beauty transforms into an ominous, yet OK appearance. Her mother is not pleased to have her daughter back in this manner of twisted reality. I got chills when the new Ellie said to her father, that her mommy doesn’t like her anymore and concludes to herself it’s OK, I don’t like her either.
When the dead come back to life in this movie, they are not mindless zombies craving the flesh of the living. The dead speak and their minds work, but to what extent of good or evil? This month’s release of “Pet Sematary” has a very broad ending, leaving much to be determined.
A solid three stars for this year’s “Pet Sematary.”
Mark (Izzy) Schurr
