Film Review - Pet Semetary

Directors Kevin Kolsch and Dennis Widmyer alongside writer Matt Greenberg take the Stephen King classic novel down a different path with Pet Semetary. Louis (Jason Clarke) and Rachel (Amy Seimetz) take their children 8-year-old Ellie (Jete Laurence ) and preschooler Gage (Lucas Lavoie) out from the city of Boston to Maine to slow down a bit and give physician Louis a slower pace to spend more time with the family. Upon arrival at their new country home, they are greeted by speeding transport trucks racing down the street inches from their front driveway. Next Ellie wanders into the back yard to see a  procession of mask-clad kids walking behind a deceased dog in a wheelbarrow headed into the woods looking to perform a burial ritual. Curious by the events she heads out later meeting Jeb (John Lithgow) the pair strike up a quick bond with Jeb filling in the new arrivals on some of customs and traditions of the town.

The pace of the film drags to some extent in the opening acts. The parents have a heartfelt conversation with Ellie about death early on in the proceeding Louis believes his eight- year-old daughter can hear the truth while Mom Rachel wants to shield her from the harsher realities of the world.  Things begin to pick up when the family cat Church becomes road kill for one of those speeding tanker.  Jeb helps  Louis to bury the feline up beyond the Pet Semetary that is actually an abandoned Native burial ground where things come back but they are not the same.

Relative newcomer Jete Laurence dominates the frame when she is on screen as Ellie. She is inquisitive, adventurous and challenging to her parents as she approaches her 9th birthday. The young actress has a lot to do in the final act being a pivotal figure in the plot flip in the film. Jason Clarke gets to broaden his acting skills as Louis. He is a medical doctor that is a pragmatic follower of science but when strange events begin to occur at work and outside his bedroom window he jumps in with both feet headed towards the predictable negative outcome. Amy Seimetz who has indie directing, writing and acting credits in her background is dealing with daemons and extreme guilt stemming from to in the. She does not know the full extent of what Jeb and her Husband have been up to in the woods but as a faith-based woman wants no part of it.

Pet Semetary is a different take on the Stephen King novel adapted to the screen. The final third turns upside down the viewers' sense of the film up to that point. Your rooting interest will shift from character to character until it lands on the most unlikely spot at the end of the film. The film finds its legs when it moves away from the obligatory jump scares moving to face to face and hand to hand combat using both sharp and blunt objects to bring the horror down to and below ground level.

*** Out of 4.

Pet Semetary |  Kevin Kolsch / Dennis Widmyer | U.S.A. | 2019 | 101 Minutes.

Tags: Stephen King Novel, Burial Ground, Wendigo, Cat, Birthday Party, Funeral, Procession, Animal Masks, Toy Bunny Rabbit, Dumb Waiter.