IT: Chapter Two

Biggest disappointment of the year so far - 5.5/10

by Mohammed Al Mazidi - Cinema Trekker

 

One of the most anticipated horror film of this year, and with good reason. It's predecessor released in 2017, and surprisingly it was a pretty decent remake and I enjoyed it. Unfortunately I do not feel the same with this one. This film was pretty disappointing and underwhelming.
 
The film started well, and set the dark tone perfectly, but slowly as the film progressed, the flaws become apparent. The cast selection is great and the performances were good, particularly Bill Hader who was hilarious throughout the entire film. For a film that is nearly 3 hours long, the film was way too long and definitely felt stretched with unnecessary flashbacks. I get it, they want to point out certain scenes that happened before, but I mean if I want to see the kids, I will go watch chapter one. Let's talk about Pennywise, first of all, he barely had screen-time, 2nd of all, he barely had screen-time. Bill Skarsgård , does really well in his role as Pennywise, but it doesn't help if we barely see him in the film, but when he is, he is great. The tone was so inconsistent, and felt more like a comedy film than it was a horror film. I am not saying it's wrong to have a comedic tone in a horror film, but balance it out for gods sake, there are horror films that do this perfectly like The Cabin in the Woods and Shaun of the Dead.  Also, that ending was very dumb. It was underwhelming, unsatisfying, and all my questions I had from both films, left unanswered. 
 
The cinematography was alright, nothing really special. There were some awkward cuts here and there, and there is one edit that I felt so out of nowhere, that it was confusing more than it was funny. Jumpscares, jumpscares, jumpscares, jumpscares. This film had so many jumpscares, almost all of them predictable, and all of them annoying rather than being actually scary. Barely any tension and/or suspense (except for that old lady scene, I loved that).
 
In conclusion, I see the intent that Andy Muschietti wanted to display here, and while I appreciate the effort, this is just an unsatisfying result especially with all the potential it had. A disappointing film, that has some enjoyable moments, but not enough to hide the evident flaws.  What turned out to be one of the most anticipated film of this year, has become the most underwhelming so far. 

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