By Sol Gray

I had the supposed honor of seeing the new “It” movie last week, and I decided I had some things to say about it.  

Now, I did see the movie rather late and didn’t originally have the intention to see it at all.  So unfortunately, I had already seen any memes and spoilers about Pennywise, the demon-clown antagonist, which took away from the horror aspect of it.  Pennywise being the clown that is the main antagonist of the movie.  But my boyfriend had free passes for the movie, so we went to go see it. And this too does contain spoilers, so if you still want to see it, then you shouldn’t be reading this.  

The film was Bad; I capitalize bad so that you all know how bad it was. The acting was amazing, and Finn Wolfhard continues to be my favorite actor, but remaking a film originally made in the ‘80s for TV just doesn’t seem like a good idea to me. I was constantly figuring out points (the ones that weren’t spoiled, that is) in the plot despite never having seen the original movie or read the book. “It” is a very predictable movie that may invoke fear in children, but most adults I’ve seen say they found it more funny than scary. I don’t agree that it’s funny — more boring than funny, using jump-scares as a tactic to scare rather than the plot.

After the film was over, my friend asked me how it was, and I said what I thought: The best part in the movie is when the Jewish kid is reading one of the most boring parts of the Torah in Hebrew for his Mitzvah. I find that to be the best part because I can relate. If I wasn’t Jewish, the best part would probably be every time Richie speaks, and even then it’s almost overdoing it — but hey, it’s the ‘80s and he’s a teenager, so what can you do?”

I believe the problem is that these movies and the book are technically marketed towards adults, but have an actual audience of children who want to defy their parents and see scary movies.

I know if I were to show my little cousins this, they would be scared out of their minds, not because of the jump-scares, or the constant piano banging that makes this movie “scary,” but because they would imagine what Pennywise might turn into for them. Whereas us adults are all over the place saying, “LMAO, Pennywise can’t turn into my student loans” — well, that’s because he’s not meant to scare YOU. He’s meant to scare children. He eats the fear of children because they (normally) don’t have to worry about money and bills and the constant fear of dying alone; they’re scared of monsters under the bed, bugs that are bigger than their little fingernail and clowns.

The “It” movie had a lot of potential, and I was almost excited to see it.  And I am super not excited to see the 2019 release about the adults perspective on Pennywise, because that’s a thing, I guess.