The master of horror, Stephen King, has had his work subjected to many big- and small-screen adaptations. Some have been great, and some have been, well, less so. The question is, where does the updated Pet Sematary fall? If I’m working on a scale of It to The Dark Tower, it’s solidly in the middle.

Pet Sematary follows the story of Louis Creed (Jason Clarke), a burned out and overworked doctor who relocates his family – wife Rachel (Amy Seimetz), daughter Ellie (Jeté Laurence) and son Gage (Hugo Lavoie and Lucas Lavoie) – from Boston to rural Maine, where Creed takes up the post of campus doctor at Ludlow’s university. While settling into his new, slow-paced job, the Creed family explore the woods near their new rustic home.

It’s deep in these dark woods where Ellie discovers a mysterious, hidden burial ground – labelled as the Pet Sematary – and runs into their new neighbour, Jud Crandall (John Lithgow). Kindly, but reserved, Crandall is the driving force behind what happens to the Creed family, starting with the untimely death of the family cat Church and ending in a far, far darker place.

Lithgow’s performance is by far one of the best things about this version of Pet Sematary. Though the bar for acting was already rather low after the first on-screen iteration from 1989, this cast puts in a vastly improved performance. I’m still not entirely convinced that Clarke is a strong enough presence to lead a film, though he fared well enough. Seimetz is more convincing as the worrying, mentally fragile Rachel. Laurence’s Ellie is a mix of serious and precocious, but not enough to irritate.

Unfortunately, whatever gusto the cast put into their characters is sidelined for the horror aspects of the film. Yes, I’m well aware that Pet Sematary is a horror movie, but when the focus is on freaking out the audience, you’re going to lose some nuance, both in performance and in the story.

Of the many themes that Pet Sematary could explore – from the fear of death and what happens to our loved ones, to the process of grief and how dead is, indeed, sometimes better – we get some hints at a deeper meaning, but that’s all they really are: Moments of possibly thematically rich storytelling that are glossed over for the next scene with a jump scare. I can only really make the connections between Rachel’s allegorical flash-backs to what’s happening in the present because I’ve read the source material. Otherwise, it’s not well presented or tied together.

This maddening gap between what’s happening on-screen and what we should be picking up between the lines is where Pet Sematary lets us down the most. We should be caring about the Creeds and their history. We should be lost in the quagmire of their grief. But the film can’t seem to draw that element in. Ultimately, what happens to the Creeds throughout the film is a tragedy, but you don’t really get the sense that these poor people are anything more than horror movie fodder.

I will say that what horror is present in the movie is done well. There is a lot of insidious build-up and some obviously telegraphed, but nonetheless effective, shocks and jump-scares. Pet Sematary is grounded for a horror movie, leaning more towards body horror than to weird hauntings or obvious demons. You can almost believe that there really is something malevolent in those woods.

Truth be told, Pet Sematary could have done better for itself. Make the storytelling more expansive, explore the wealth of topics from the source material, dial back a bit on overtly shocking the audience and you’d have a thrilling, nail-bitingly good horror. In this case, thanks to the gulf between its story, characters and its determination to scare, Pet Semetary is just another horror film, with little to distinguish itself from its peers.

Last Updated: April 16, 2019

Pet Sematary
Raised from the dead for a second turn on the big screen, Pet Sematary seems to have come back... wrong. There are elements of a better film hidden between the horror, but what we do get is effective enough for now.
5.5
57/ 100

9 Comments

  1. Original Heretic

    April 16, 2019 at 11:52

    Well shit.
    After King said that it was scary, I had high hopes.

    Reply

    • Magoo

      April 16, 2019 at 14:03

      What? I didn’t say anything of the sort.

      Reply

    • Tracy Benson

      April 16, 2019 at 15:00

      It is definitely scary, or at least I thought it was (I’m such a baby in horror movies though). Like I mentioned, the horror parts were very good. It just could have been a better film overall.

      Reply

      • Original Heretic

        April 16, 2019 at 15:00

        I’d rather have a good movie that isn’t all that scary (like IT) than a poor movie that is scary.

        Reply

        • Tracy Benson

          April 16, 2019 at 15:54

          Same, which is why I’m sad about this. Walked out of the preview screening feeling very… meh about it

          Reply

          • Original Heretic

            April 16, 2019 at 16:03

            Sadly, this is par for the course when it comes to adaptations of King’s novels. Out of all those that have been turned into movies, only a handful have been good.
            Then again, I suppose the same can be said for any movie/book adaptation.
            The good ones are a rarity.

  2. Jacques Van Zyl

    April 16, 2019 at 12:00

    Was hoping this would be better than it now seems.

    Reply

    • Bella White

      April 16, 2019 at 15:17

      Yeah, the same.

      Reply

  3. BradeLunner

    April 17, 2019 at 22:56

    This movie really messed me up as a kid, my slightly older cousins watched it at my house, which means I had to watch it too, and had to sneak into my parents bedroom to watch the digital clock count down to sunrise while I tried to think about strawberries (I was a kid, they seemed safe, go figure) to deal with the fear

    Reply

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