I Saw It

It is the last movie you would expect me to see.  Literally.  But, as I don't scare easily at the sight of clowns and red balloons, I headed to the cineplex.   The attraction for me was to investigate the reason for the big box office.  And I was intrigued by one of the screen shots that made this look like an Our Gang adventure.

Well, re: the latter, hardly.

Now the last time I read a Stephen King book was 150 years ago.   It might have been the one with the killer dog.  Or the killer cat.  Or the killer gerbil.  I forget. Well, this one is about a killer clown and my mind takes me back to my mother's collection of figurines which I still have in my New York apartment some place.

Clowns, clowns, and more clowns.

I'm not bothered by them but a lot of people are.  And, hence, this is why the movie based on the book probably works so well.   There is an embedded fear in lots of folks already.   The cinematic images have less work to do in bringing along the horror and the fear.

Whereas a promotional photo for me invoked memories of Buckwheat and Porky in the haunted house, the real comparison for It would be the the Netflix series "Stranger Things."  In a lot of ways, It is a complete copy of that plot.   Kids in a small town start disappearing.  You apparently can't trust the adults. And a rainbow collection of moppets that include all races, sizes, and shapes. There's a stutterer.  There's a Black kid.  There's a Jewish kid.  There's a fat kid. There's a girl.  There's an asthmatic kid.  If they somehow managed to work in a transgendering kid, this would also turn into a segment of the Rachel Maddow Show.

Like "Stranger Things," It is set in the 80s as the current crop of filmmakers honors their big-haired youth.  Derry, Maine has some sort of convoluted history of a children's home exploding at the turn of the century.  For some reason, the clown behind it all returns every 27 or so years to replenish his dead kid collection.  

Oddly, this turns out to be a lot of fun.   The no-name kids are an engaging and funny bunch.   The no-name adults are appropriately sinister.   And the clown is scary the first 35 times he pops up.  That's the ultimate problem with It.  The clown must have killed the film editor in the first reel, because It comes in at a completely ludicrous running time of 135 minutes.  Heck, whenever Abbott and Costello wound up in a haunted mansion with Bela Lugosi, they managed to get out in about one hours and ten minutes.  To say that It is way too long might actually be an understatement.

As a result of the elongated length, you are no longer scared when the clown pops up for the 187th time.  For the first 90 minutes, It works like a charm.   But, like most things coming out of Hollywood these days, nobody knows how to leave well enough alone.  The last 45 minutes seem hopelessly redundant and yawn-inducing.

It had me.  And then It didn't.

LEN'S RATING:  Two-and-a-half stars.

Dinner last night:  The pre-game buffet at the Dodger Dugout Club.