IT (2017)

Sometimes a film arrives at exactly the right time. The China Syndrome came out twelve days before Three Mile Island’s nuclear near-disaster. Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom opened in South Africa one week prior to the great man’s death. And in 2017, Stephen King’s IT hits the big screen after a summer of flops. One year after a worldwide “killer clown” craze. And one year after the election of a clown to the White House.

When I was eleven, I watched the IT mini-series (1990) on TV with my brother and sister. We were terrified. Especially when a dog food advertisement appeared, asking why the dog “always chooses the clown” chew toy. Tim Curry’s Pennywise was uncontainable: he could even invade commercials! He soon invaded my dreams. Within a few years, I forgot about IT. My dreams became much more fun – if stickier. When I was sixteen, I saw a close friend reading this massive 1600-page tome. Like all great Stephen King novels, it featured a prepubescent sewer orgy. My friend gushed over the book. Meanwhile, I was read more mainstream fare: the Twilight Saga finale, Breaking Dawn. The wholesome mix of paedophilic werewolves, and vampire fang C-sections.

The novel’s timeline suggests a new adaptation is ripe: it has indeed indeed been 27 years since Pennywise’s last appearance. This film is superior to the mini-series in every way – except for Tim Curry’s seminal performance. Like Stranger Things, IT is an unlikely mix of a 1980s coming-of-age film (Stand By Me, The Goonies) and conventional horror. Like chocolate and peanut butter, this makes for a surprisingly palatable treat. IT’s writing is funny and warm. Like Stanger Things, its characters are likeable and well-defined. Its cinematography is lush. Its musical score soars and creeps in equal measures. Its retro production design is nostalgic, without fetishing the period.

Clocking in at a flabby 2 hours and 15 minutes, IT’s placing is slack. Horror films should be tightly wound as a mechanical watch. IT slows in its latter half,  when it should be accelarating. The audience relaxes and it is more difficult to ramp up tension. Actor Bill Skarsgard is effective as Pennywise. But we see the clown too frequently, often in the sunny outdoors. He loses his scare factor as the film progresses. And the overabundance of CGI monsters is distracting and unconvincing. And among the children, the rabbi’s son character seems flat and under-developed.That said, I heartily recommend IT. It’s not the scariest film of the year (mother!). Nor the cleverest (Get Out). But it thrills and warms the heart in equal measures. This film is setting the box office alight: I watched it in a sold-out theatre. It might well become the highest-grossing horror film of all time. I look forward to the release of IT: Chapter 2.

I’d wager it won’t take 27 years to appear.