3.5 stars. Rated R, for dramatic intensity, profanity, highly disturbing violent content and gore
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 9.6.19
This impressively creepy chiller delivers a relentless 100 minutes of gruesome, appalling, terrifying, look-between-your-fingers heart-stoppers.
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| Having made their way into the heart of Evil's lair, our heroes — from left, Bev (Jessica Chastain), Mike (Isaiah Mustafa) and Ben (Jay Ryan) — are confronted by yet another in an endless wave of ookie-spooky monstrosities. |
Director Andy Muschietti and scripter Gary Dauberman leave no horror movie cliché neglected — no phobia unexploited — in their handsomely mounted, atmosphere-drenched conclusion to Stephen King’s 1986 best-seller.
Unfortunately, this film runs 169 minutes.
It doesn’t matter whether we’re discussing chocolate milk shakes or cinematic shocks; indulge too much, and the result simply becomes bland.
Which is ironic, because the best part of 2017’s It was the clever way in which Muschietti and his writers — Dauberman was assisted that time by Chase Palmer and Cary Fukunaga — stripped away the over-written dead flesh of King’s 1,138-page exercise in diminishing returns. With this second “half” of King’s saga, they’ve succumbed to the same self-indulgent excess.
Quite a pity. Particularly since the first two acts are — no question — macabre and terrifying at every turn.
Doesn’t matter what irrationally frightens or repulses you; Muschietti and Dauberman tap into it. Spiders? Claustrophobia? Disgusting flying bugs? Long, dark hallways? Slithery, worm-like nasties? Naked old people?
Clowns?
Clowns with massive, jaw-stretching, needle-sharp teeth? (The better to eat you with, my dear…)
There’s actually much to admire in this grim fantasy’s concluding installment, starting with an ensemble of well-cast actors who persuasively feel like grown-up versions of the first film’s adolescent heroes. Dauberman also manages the clever feat of integrating this sequel with its predecessor’s events, while simultaneously making it a coherent stand-alone experience for anybody unfamiliar with that 2017 entry. (Likely no more than one or two of you, but still…)
