Pet Sematary

Maybe I’m starting to get immune to the run-of-the-mill horror films that gets produced these days but Pet Sematary did next to nothing for me. Everything just seemed to unfold too easily and too quickly and I never felt tense or on edge, in fact barring one particular moment this film felt entirely flat.

The jump scares were well signposted and hence almost entirely ineffective and there was no mood built up and no effective tone created by the performances or the direction from Dennis Widmyer and Kevin Kölsch. The performances of Jason Clarke and Amy Seimetz as the parents feels one-note, Jeté Laurence as Ellie has a little more to do and does it fairly well. The one redeeming factor for me was John Lithgow’s performance as Jud, but even that felt slightly muted or maybe wasn’t given the time it deserved.

The one moment of pure tension and fear, and this got a reaction out of me, was the truck crash scene. It was extremely well handled and the effective build up paid off in the outcome. Add to this that I’m a parent of young children who has always had a fear about them wandering off onto the road and it makes sense that this scene has the most effect on me by far.

I think this film would have been greatly improved by having more time spent on the characters’ development and the family ties (that are obviously so important to this story but aren’t really fully explored here). This in turn would enhance the potential moments of threat and enable the viewer to engage with the situation more. As it stands though, I had no connection to any of the Creed family and had no feeling either way if they survived or died.