Pet Sematary (1989)

Film: Pet Sematary (1989)

Stars: Dale Midkiff, Fred Gwynne, Denise Crosby, Miko Hughes

Director: Mary Lambert

Oscar History: No nominations

Snap Judgment Ranking: 2/5 stars

All October long, The Many Rantings of John is running a marathon dedicated to the Horror classics of the 1960's-00's that I'm seeing for the first time this month.  If you want to take a look at past titles from previous horror marathons (both this and other seasons) check out the links at the bottom of this article.

Stephen King is an interesting conundrum for older filmgoers.  We have lived long enough with King that he's celebrated.  His books have been reevaluated to the point where he has won the National Medal of Arts and took the life achievement prize at the National Book Awards (much to Harold Bloom's chagrin).  But there was a time that a Stephen King movie was not greeted with critical hosannas, or at least intrigue.  In fact, at one point, King's name on a movie was kind of a invitation for a drubbing from the critics, even if the film made money.  A case of that is Pet Sematary, which in 1989 was a solid hit for Paramount, but was lambasted by critics like Gene Siskel & Leonard Maltin, who gave it their worst scores.  Watching it, I both understand (based on what we value in films today) it has gotten a reappraisal...and also think that Siskel & Maltin had a point when it was first released.

(Spoilers Ahead) The movie is about a small town in Maine, where Louis (Midkiff) & Rachel (Crosby) have moved with their children, including younger son Gage (Hughes) in hopes of having a quiet life where Louis will serve as a small-town doctor.  They meet their unusual neighbor Jud Crandell (Gwynne), who shows them the local Pet Cemetery (the name is misspelled on the sign, and thus in the title for this picture).  Their daughter is worried that her cat will end up in the pet cemetery, and indeed, the cat is run over, which is when some of the nonsense starts.  Jud takes Louis to an ancient Indian burial ground, one where if you bury the dead, they'll come back to life...but in a demonic form.  He doesn't tell him about the demonic form thing until after, of course, and we soon see the cat trying to attack Louis, now with glowing eyes.  Shortly, after, Gage is also killed by a truck, and killed.  Instead of letting him stay dead, Louis sneaks to the burial ground and buries Gage...and in this case he comes back as a demon child, one who kills both Rachel & Jud before Louis kills him.  In the coda of the film, Louis then buries Rachel...who comes back and kills him in the film's final scene.

Here's where I have to out myself a little bit with maybe my biggest pet peeve as a film-watcher, even if the pet peeve isn't entirely fair to the filmmakers: I hate when stupidity is a plot device.  In real life, people are perpetually stupid-we all make mistakes that make no logical sense, and we all know people who continually make bad decisions.  But in a movie, I always find it a bit cheap.  And that's what this movie is-it's pretty cheap.

Take Jud for example.  Why, exactly, having known that both a man and a dog being buried in the cemetery resulted in them being possessed, did he even offer to Louis that this was an option for the cat?  The excuse in the film is that his daughter wasn't ready for death...but he knew the solution was clearly worse.  It'd be like running a lawn mower you know the blade is loose on just because you gotta mow the lawn-it's so stupid!  And the rest of the movie continues this.  Louis & Rachel are terrible parents, as not once but twice they let their toddler son play unsupervised near a road.  Listen, parents are judging on a different scale in the 1980's, but I was Gage's age in the 1980's, and I can promise you-my parents wouldn't have let me play anywhere near a highway or road like that (I wasn't allowed more than 100 feet from the main highway on our family farm even when I was much older than Gage).  It's insane how many things in this movie are preventable, and while some of the performances are fun (specifically Gwynne), and the visuals are great (not just the creepy cemetery, but also Dale Midkiff naked in a bath tub), it does not make up for the fact that there's something clearly missing in translation from King's novel and this movie. 

1920's: The Golem, The Phantom of the Opera

1930's: The Black Cat, The Bride of Frankenstein, Dracula, Dracula's Daughter, Frankenstein, Freaks, The Invisible Man, Mad Love, The Mummy, The Old Dark House, The Raven, Son of Frankenstein, Werewolf of London

1940's: Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein, Cat People, Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man, House of Dracula, The House of Frankenstein, The Invisible Man Returns, The Invisible Man's Revenge, The Invisible Woman, The Ghost of Frankenstein, Invisible Agent, The Mummy's Curse, The Mummy's Ghost, The Mummy's Hand, The Mummy's Tomb, Phantom of the Opera, She-Wolf of London, Son of Dracula, The Uninvited, The Wolf Man

1950's: Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man, Abbott & Costello Meet the Mummy, Attack of the 50-Foot Woman, The Blob, Creature from the Black Lagoon, The Creature Walks Among Us, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, It Came from Outer Space, Revenge of the Creature

1960's: The Devil Rides Out, The Innocents, The Masque of the Red Death, Night of the Living Dead,Village of the Damned

1970's: The Amityville Horror, Black Christmas, Carrie, Dawn of the Dead, Don't Look Now, Halloween, The Hills Have Eyes, The Omen, Phantom of the Paradise, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, When a Stranger Calls, The Wicker Man

1980's: Altered States, An American Werewolf in London, The Changeling, Child's Play, The Evil Dead, The Fly, The Fog, Friday the 13th, Gremlins, Hellraiser, The House on Sorority Row, A Nightmare on Elm Street, Poltergeist, Poltergeist II: The Other Side, Sleepaway Camp, The Thing

1990's-Present: Arachnophobia, The Blair Witch Project, Bram Stoker's Dracula, Candyman, I Know What You Did Last Summer, Paranormal Activity, Scary Movie, Scream