Movie Details
| Title: | It Chapter Two | |
| Director: | Andy Muschietti | |
| Year: | 2019 | |
| Genre: | Horror | |
| Times Seen: | 1 | |
| Last Seen: | 09.13.19 |
Other Movies Seen By This Director (1)
- It
| Date Viewed | Venue | Note |
| 09.13.19 | Cinemark Pflugerville | Played Hooky from work to see this in the theater. I figure with Fantastic Fest getting underway next week I need to get back into the habit of sitting in theaters... Although you know... the state of theaters these days. Both this Tinseltown (or whatever they call it nowadays) and the Galaxy Highland had comfy reclining seats with plenty of arm and leg room. I'm trying not to be pre-biased toward discomfort but something tells me that the stale beer smell of the Alamo won't be quite as nice and updated when I get down there. We'll see though... stay positive stay positive. Anyway, My lasting memories of the first It film are that it was pretty good except the part where they repeat the same scene seven times in a row where each kid gets scared by It in its various forms. I also remember thinking they were shooting themselves in the foot because the stuff with the adults wasn't as good as the stuff with the kids so the second movie was going to have a hard time. Well, imagine my surprise when a scene pops up where Mike says "hey everyone needs to go have a scene on their own where you get scared by It, then let's meet back here" and they proceed, once again, to have the same scene six times in a row. I guess it gives the films a nice symmetry? At least they had some flashbacks to the kids though. That brought the nice inter-weaving that I remember fondly from the book that was missing in the first film. And for the most part they used available CG to do a bunch of scenes that you couldn't really do back in the 80s so it was pretty cool to see stuff like the old lady and Paul Bunyan and things like that. I also like most of the adult cast with the exception of Ben. They changed the ending. Not only did they change the ending but they have a running joke about Bill writing terrible endings. I am definitely in the camp of agreeing that most pre-2000 Stephen King books had weak endings but it's a tiny bit self-referential for me here. Especially when you have James Ransone and Bill Hader being funny enough to supply the requisite comic relief. I think I remember from the book saying something like "you used the word 'fuck' 568 times in your last book' which is better. Actually, overall... not that much time is spent on the characters' success. It still comes through that they're all successful which I guess is all you need... but anyway, this new ending is probably better. Certainly more movie-ish (especially with Bev and Ben). I'm not 100% on my memory of the book but I feel like the Native American stuff wasn't in there? Of course - i think I mentioned this in my notes for the first movie - one of my strongest memories of the book is an anecdote I think Mike reads from the 1800s where the whole town shot down some bandit in the street. These little anecdotes to show that not only has It been there a very long time but It also has a seeping effect on the whole town, turning it Dark. I'm pretty surprised they kept the opening scene in. It seemed a little more topical when the book first came out but I guess it still works now. Ok, I've rambled on long enough. For the record, I liked it ok. I don't think it was as strong as the first movie but it's still one of my favorite books and I think they did a good job adapting it to screen. It felt a little long, especially at the end, but I guess that's fine. I'd rather that than have them rush stuff. |
