IT: Chapter 2 – a review

After 27 years Pennywise has awakened again. The bodies of his killing spree confirm this for Mike, the last of the ‘Losers Club’ left in Derry, Maine.

As he contacts his friends to uphold the oath they made as teenagers, the final stage is set to defeat the monster nicknamed ‘IT’.

 

I wrote this review on the basis of the theatrical release of IT: Chapter 2 in 2019. So before the extended version was brought out. And before the possible release of Andrés Muschietti’s ultimate version of IT (combining chapters 1 and 2 into one movie).

Ouch

Something went very wrong with this second chapter. It’s like the moviemakers decided to cut all the things that made the first movie rather good and increased on the things that made the first movie bad.

Maybe I was sucked into the hype (the deadlights). Maybe I expected the movie to fulfil my each and every expectation and then some. This could very well be. But –as I wrote before in my review of Game of Thrones: season 8- I’m usually ‘oke’ with a movie going in another direction than I expected. Not with IT though. This movie pretty much managed to rub me the wrong way constantly throughout the 2 hours 50 minutes running time.

Yikes

The scares don’t work because the only scares in this movie are jump-scares. There is only a shimmer here and there of actual suspense (pretty much every scene with a ‘non-Loser-kid’ involved). But, then, when the manifestation of the monster comes to show the audience is treated with a ghastly CGI-monstrosity. This kills the movie. Each time the scare scene happens you jump up a little and then you laugh not out of that pleasant old feeling of ‘you got me’, but because said monster looks detached, dare I say, unfitting (unfinished?).

It doesn’t help that the movie constantly throws funny remarks at the audience.

Which made me wonder what the heck I was watching a horror or a comedy.

Phoe

Talking about detached the whole of two hours the movie treats the audience with one contained scare scene after another. There’s a scene for old Richie and a scene for young Richie; A scene for old Bev and a scene for young Bev. It’s like the movie is ticking all the boxes with the flimsiest story to attach those scenes together.

This is strange because, as any movie fan will tell you (especially horror movie fans), you need the audience to invest in the characters for the scares to work. IT: Chapter 2 just shows a whole shebang of character reacting to the monster’s manifestation without enough emphasis on the characters and their relations with each other.

Richie and Beverly might get a bit more character work in the movie but Bill is utterly downplayed and stays pretty one-dimensional throughout the sordid tale.

Aargh

Bowers arrives and is forgotten in a heartbeat. It is truly a miss that such a potentially great nemesis
is demoted to a timewaster.

Then there are the scenes-without consequence. The Gay-couple-scene(s) or the Buying-the-bike-scene are, pretty much, useless. These scenes add nothing to the movie. There's no cause-and-effect. Nothing that happens later on that requires that particular previous bit of story.

 

According to online rumour the gay-couple-scene does have a fallout in a court scene. But it got edited out. So now we are left with a scene that’s basically Pennywise getting dinner. No matter how brave or well acted the scene is it adds nothing to the grand story of IT.

Uhm

Because IT: Chapter 2 relies on separate scare scenes with only the smallest story in-between the movie feels far too long. There is so much this movie could cut to make it a manageable two hours. ‘Kill your darlings’, the audience doesn’t need another young Richie or Eddie scare-scene, this chapter is about the adults.

Also, Stanley’s final entry…just no.

Whee

But that’s enough of me ranting. Every cloud has a silver lining and there are only a handful of movies that I truly detest with a vengeance. IT: Chapter 2 has its good sides as well.

The acting is fine (especially Bill Hayder is a scene stealer). The Barrens flashback scene is hilarious. There are some clever scare scenes (the mirror maze, the old woman build-up), but that’s about it.

Then I read other reviews online (people who are faster than me in posting ramblings).They often applauded the CGI tomfoolery. They enjoyed the combination of havoc and humour.

I disagree. I think IT (the full story) should be dark, unpleasant and traumatising. This horror movie, for me, should be akin to Hereditary (2018) or In the mouth of madness (1995); bleak and dark. Not Homebound (2016), The final girl (2016) or Behind the mask: the rise of Lesley Vemon (2014). We are talking about traumatized kids here...the tongue firmly in cheek simply doesn’t fit.

So, in the end, it is the style of the movie that doesn’t work for me.

Nope

IT: Chapter 2 feels to me like it missed the mark completely. Competently shot and acted and still this movie doesn’t work. Now, this can all be fixed. The CGI tomfoolery can be turned around. The editing can be pruned just the make the movie more solid.

I’m actually looking forwards to Andrés Muschietti’s ultimate version of IT. Maybe if he sticks to the book he can get a solid movie out of it.

Still no space-turtle though.

Again, like the 1990 mini-series before it, it is the adult chapter that doesn’t work. There is potential but, down to brass tacks, what I saw was sometimes good in parts but certainly wasn’t that good as a whole. As the losers always said: “We have to stick together!” Unfortunately Chapter 2 doesn’t stick.