Horror Stephen King's "IT" Part I and Part II

[Primal Slayer]

Curry's Pennywise is more effective to me since he could be any clown. He really lured you in and then BAM! Ate you.

 

[terry78]

'It: Chapter 2' Floats to #1 with $185 Million Global Debut - Box Office Mojo

Well we knew it wouldn't flop. Muschietti did say with King's input he wanted to do kind of a prequel down the line about IT's first encounters with humans, etc.

 

[Doctor Jones]

That second act was slow and didn't work because it didn't teach us anything we didn't already know about the kids. Ritchie was the only exception and it should have been the same for the others if this was where they wanted to go with it. Otherwise, it's just wheel spinning and just reaffirmation of what we already know from the last movie. I get the point was for them to find their mementos, but those were things we already knew? This whole amnesia thing was wonky. I liked how this movie had the theme of memory to be housed in to be a whole film and not just a second part, but the execution of this memory stuff doesn't work and makes a lot of the narrative suffer.

Pennywise having a range was unnecessary and was just convoluted. How about they just grew up and forgot? It still stays true to the theme and its cleaner. How it effected them still remains in them but it's just part of being an adult. Does it make much logical sense? Not so much, but I think it's more thematically sound than an overly logical explanation. Stop writing for Cinema Sins and worry about how something is more dramatized.

It's one of the reasons why the final hour worked best for me. All of that stuff was out of the way and the themes and their characters actually culminated.

 

[DarkKnight88]

I’m sure WB is jumping at the chance for an IT prequel.

 

[Arachnerd]

Curious to see what scenes Andy Muschietti is going to film for the supercut.

 

[kguillou]

'It: Chapter 2' Floats to #1 with $185 Million Global Debut - Box Office Mojo

Well we knew it wouldn't flop. Muschietti did say with King's input he wanted to do kind of a prequel down the line about IT's first encounters with humans, etc.

With its 60-70 mill budget this movie already broke even and everything from here is gravy and profit. Big success even if not as big as its predecessor.

 

[DarthSkywalker]

They also played a couple in a bad marriage in some movie before.

Yep. "The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby". What somehow makes this better is, it was actually three movies. "Him", Her", and "Them". Where you watch the relationship from each perspective. So that's actually 5 movies together at least.

 

[DarthSkywalker]

Curious to see what scenes Andy Muschietti is going to film for the supercut.

"FILM EVERYTHING!!!!!!!!!!"

 

[DarthSkywalker]

I was trying to figure out what Ben's role really was in these flicks and he's pretty much the heart. He's the nicest and most earnest one of the group, even as an adult. The rest of them are nice but all kinda have their own personal **** that keeps them from being Ben level nice.

Ben's role was to look like a a comic accurate buff Doctor Strange.

 

[terry78]

The one thing they did nail was how to do an ensemble with no one character overshadowing another. I know it's always been touted as Bill's story but he never had anymore development than the others. There was no Wolverine and the X-Men type **** going on.

 

[FunkMiller]

As a huge fan of the book (and of Stephen King's whole literary multiverse) I have pretty mixed feelings on Part 2, but overall I really enjoyed it and I'm definitely glad that these films were made, I maintain that they're still vastly better adaptations of the book than the 90's mini-series. My review will focus mainly on my reaction to the film as a fan of the source material.

Firstly, as to the length, yeah it's a very long film but I can't say I really felt it until near the end. The final battle just dragged on for way too long, IMO. And it wasn't even faithful to the book to make up for it. No macroverse, no Maturin, the Ritual of Chud was different, no revelation that It is actually female and pregnant, no destruction of Derry... It just deviated far too much from the book to be satisfying to me. But I feel there were an awful lot of positives too:

Spoiler

- The casting of the adult Losers was just top notch, they all matched their child counterparts so well that it was almost freaky at some parts, I genuinely bought that the children and the adults were indeed the same people throughout. The highlights were definitely Bill Hader as Richie and James Ransom as Eddie, the latter of which I feel is not getting nearly enough credit for his performance. Eddie's death (and Richie's reaction to it), even though I of course knew it was coming, was legitimately heartbreaking. The whole adult group had great chemistry and played off each other really well, just as the kids did before them.

- Speaking of underrated performances, Bill Skarsgård is genuinely fantastic as Pennywise in this, even better than in Chapter One. The best scene in the movie by far is the scene with Pennywise and the little girl under the bleachers, that's the closest to book Pennywise we have ever seen in live action to date, disturbing and manipulative to a tee, playing on the little girl's fears of rejection because of her appearance to bait and lure her in. Chilling. Skarsgård is a great actor.

- Beverly and Ben ending up together. I love their relationship in the book so much, and being a big fan of book!Ben I was worried that the film would deviate from the book and go for the more standard and expected ending of Beverly and Bill ending up together, so I was really glad to see them stick with the book on this one. I'm a hopeless romantic, so sue me.

And now for the biggest negatives:

Spoiler

- I echo what others have said in here that the film focuses so much on the Losers that Derry itself becomes almost a non-factor. One thing the book does insanely well is set the town itself up as a character in the narrative. Derry exists because of It, the town is the creature's killing field and It's influence is everywhere and in every resident. That whole element doesn't translate to the film whatsoever which is a shame. Derry could be anywhere, any small town in America because it loses it's personality in translation. Leaving out the destruction of the town at the end was a big part of that, it serves a very important narrative purpose in the book because it shows that It is really dead this time, It's influence has finally left the town and Derry collapses in on itself and starts to die as a result.

- Seriously, what was the point of Henry Bowers being in this movie? He's an extremely important character in the book (being almost as much of a threat to the Losers as Pennywise/It is at points) so I understand why they wanted to keep him in it, but his role just ended up feeling completely extraneous. When a side plot can be lifted from a movie completely without making a damn difference to the main story or the outcome, what really is the point of including it? As good as the actor was, all his story did was add to the run time and interrupt the flow of the main plot. They should have just said that he died following the events of the first film and was posthumously blamed for the child deaths and disappearances and been done with it.

- Related to the above, why on earth did they bother including the characters of Audra and Tom at the beginning of the film for neither of them to ever be mentioned again? Again, what was the point? The whole purpose of the characters being introduced in the adult part of the book (other than add to the characterisation of both Bill and Beverly) is that they end up becoming important to the plot later on, but that never happens here so including them again feels ultimately pointless. I must admit though, Eddie's wife being played by the same actress as his mother in the first film did give me a laugh though. Eddie does admit to himself in the book that he's ended up marrying his mother, so it works.

Overall, one thing I think Muschietti did really well in these films, whilst they may not be completely accurate adaptations, is echo the general nostalgic feel of King's book and maintain the idea that the horror element of the story, whilst undoubtedly important, isn't really the ultimate point. 'It' is ultimately a story about love and friendship and coming of age, the power of memory and the influence of childhood on who we end up becoming as adults. That's something I feel translated well, so while I'm disappointed that the films deviated so much from the book at some points, I'm still very glad overall that they were made and will revisit them often.

As another huge fan of the book, I entirely agree with all of this!

I wonder if book fans are less pleased with the film than non book readers because we know how much bigger, better, deeper and intelligent the story should be?

Yeah, I know you have to cut out a lot for an adaptation, but some of the wholesale changes these movies make are odd choices that rather smell of studio notes, and a general unwillingness to be more experimental and different than other horror movies.

That perhaps is my biggest disappointment. IT 2 is great in many ways, but it feels like a rather standard horror movie... whereas the narrative of the book at its conclusion most certainly does not.

 

[Art Vandelay]

When it comes to Stephen King adaptations, a lot of screen writers seem to think they can either write better than King, or feel the need to change things up just for the sake of it. The best King adaptations, to me, stay faithful to the book. And as a fan, that's I think that's what I want. For them to film the book. You might think, "well what's the point of that"? But as a fan of It, for example, there are things in the book that I think could look great on screen.

 

[Lighthouse]

When it comes to Stephen King adaptations, a lot of screen writers seem to think they can either write better than King, or feel the need to change things up just for the sake of it. The best King adaptations, to me, stay faithful to the book. And as a fan, that's I think that's what I want. For them to film the book. You might think, "well what's the point of that"? But as a fan of It, for example, there are things in the book that I think could look great on screen.

I disagree with this. I think King's stuff really needs some work to make a successful adaptation, keeping his best stuff and toning down his excesses. Changes were beneficial to The Shining, The Dead Zone, Carrie and Misery.

 

[Man in the Suit]

I think the best King adaptation is Kubrick's The Shining and he hates it.

 

[Lasirius]

I disagree with this. I think King's stuff really needs some work to make a successful adaptation, keeping his best stuff and toning down his excesses. Changes were beneficial to The Shining, The Dead Zone, Carrie and Misery.

And The Mist; my personal favorite.

 

[terry78]

His writing style can come off kinda... excessive but it's the way the stories work.

 

[Schlosser85]

He is self indulgent and has even admitted it himself, but personally I think the book of The Shining is better than the movie for much the same reason King does. Jack comes off like a one note madman who’s the same at the beginning as the end because Nicholson just looks like he’s ready to go nuts from the get go.

 

[Pennywise]

Curious to see what scenes Andy Muschietti is going to film for the supercut.

I think one of them is going to be The Black Spot since Andy wanted to include that in Chapter Two.

 

[antsman41]

There was a lot of jokes at King in this film about “endings”.

 

[Crosswind Ghost]

There was a lot of jokes at King in this film about “endings”.

Someone decided to write an ill advised article on the subject. King being the best, responded appropriately.

 

[antsman41]

How did everyone feel about the cameo?

 

[marty mcfly]

Is there some kind of reference or Easter egg that would explain the hospital orderly’s haircut? Was that thing a wig? Such a ridiculous little afro on that dude.

 

[Doctor Jones]

You guys see the after credit scene of someone wearing cowboy boots walking towards Derry?

 

[Lighthouse]

You guys see the after credit scene of someone wearing cowboy boots walking towards Derry?

Wait, what?

 

[Drizzle]

Muschietti did say with King's input he wanted to do kind of a prequel down the line about IT's first encounters with humans, etc.

I’m sure WB is jumping at the chance for an IT prequel.

There's actually quite a bit they could draw from the book for a prequel in regards to the previous cycles of It that occurred every 27 years, like the Ironworks explosion and the fire at the Black Spot.