IT

Rating: 4.5/5

IT is a film that lived up to the hype that surrounded its initial release, and continues to hold up as an unsettling, yet oddly comical, horror movie.

In the late 1980s, in the town of Derry, Maine, a young boy named Georgie (Jackson Robert Scott) goes missing after chasing a paper boat made for him by his brother Bill (Jaeden Lieberher). Months after his disappearance, Bill refuses to give up the search, and gets his close friends, Richie (Finn Wolfhard, Eddie (Jack Dylan Grazer), and Stanley (Wyatt Oleff) to help him look for his little brother.

Unfortunately for the four boys, their quest becomes more desperate as numerous children in Derry begin to disappear. At first, it is just the vast number of missing kids that are troubling Bill and his friends, but when each one of them confesses to experiencing a horrifying event involving a clown named Pennywise (Bill Skarsgard), they are quick to realize that their fight to find Georgie is going to be more terrifying and treacherous than any of them could ever have imagined.

When a movie is as talked about and as publicized as IT was, there's always the risk that it won't live up the high expectations it built for itself. Honestly, I can say going into it I had my doubts of how great it was going to be, given that so many of Stephen King's novels that had been put to film have had a tendency to get majorly lost in translation. Now, of course I am not speaking of all Stephen King movies, but a large number most certainly have failed to be as captivating and as frightening as their written source material was. Thankfully, IT was able to fully deliver everything its trailers promised the audience it was going to be and more. The film is less "make you jump out of your seat" scary, and more, "show you disturbing imagery that follows you into your nightmares" scary. The latter type of film can be a tough sell, as it can have the tendency to either go overboard, or come off as too silly. IT was able to tread the boundary between the two, making it a horror film that is rewatchable, and somehow enjoyable despite the distressing premise of the story.

What this movie had going for it from the very beginning, was the uncanny magnetism a story about a group of bike riding, foul-mouthed, preteens always seems to have. Any film that has characters like that at its core, is almost guaranteed to have a leg up when it comes to entertaining an audience. Casting for these types of films must be immensely tricky, because the kids who play the roles can't solely rely on wit, humor, or charisma. Their characters experience a hefty amount of trauma and fear, and they have to be able to make those scenes feel believable, so the audience is frightened for them and fighting for their survival. Of the young cast members, the one who I felt excelled at this task the most was Sophia Lillis, who played Beverly Marsh. Her character's home life was almost more terrifying than Pennywise itself, and Lillis was able to run the gamut of emotion needed to sell the role in its entirety. Another person deserving ample recognition, though not one of the child actors, is Bill Skarsgard. He had the difficult job of reinventing a character that was both feared and revered by fans of the 1990 mini-series starring Tim Curry. Skarsgard was able to make Pennywise his own, especially with the voicing of it, and was able to successfully bring terror to a whole new generation.

As great as the kids who make up the cast and the story of IT are, what sent this movie over the top was its setting of Derry, Maine. What may be unknown to some, is that Derry is not a real place, but is in fact a fictional one based on a small town in Maine, which just so happens to be where I have lived my whole life. I have grown up with people being fascinated by the fact that I live in the same town as Stephen King, and up until IT, I hadn't seen a big budget film based on his works that had shown the true nature of his hometown. I can tell any viewer who may be wondering, yes, IT did an incredible job at mimicking the look and feel of the town in which it was set. I can't even seem to find the words to express how surreal it is to see landmarks I have been driving passed for over twenty years, be recreated in a film I know to have been viewed by millions. The immense dedication and time the creators of IT took to make sure Derry looked like its' inspiration is what truly took this film from being one that I really enjoyed, to one that I absolutely loved.

IT: Chapter Two's release is quickly approaching, and I find that I am actually more excited for the continuation than I was for this one. Not because I think it will be better, but because I now know how brilliant the creative team behind the film is. If IT: Chapter One is indicative of how potentially frightening or bizarrely humorous Chapter Two may be, than it's practically guaranteed to be great.