"You'll Float Too." "IT" Earns It Scares And Provides Great Characters And Story

Rating: 9/10 (7 September 2017)

"IT" is an adaptation of Stephen King's novel and focuses on a group of outsiders who are bullied and after discovering a killer clown that is really a monster, they decide to take him down. I was looking forward to "IT" despite not having read the book or seen the original miniseries with Tim Curry as Pennywise. The trailers made the movie look intriguing and I thought that this could be the next big break the horror genre needs. I was very pleased.
Easily the biggest praise of this movie goes to the writing. This movie has well developed characters and cohesive storytelling. The thing I enjoyed about these characters is that they not only deal with middle school problems and bullying, but they also deal with real life problems that everyone in this world has or will face. These characters, in their early teens, also cuss a lot. It made the characters that much more relatable and realistic and provided a breath of fresh air into the horror genre, and the writers actually understood the age demographic and portrayed it beautifully. The story is also really straightforward. There are no crazy, so-called "clever" plot twists that a lot of horror movies nowadays try to include. It was cohesive and easy to follow.
Not only were the kids well written, but the actors that played them were magnificent. There was not a dull performance form any one of them. Everyone is skeptical when it comes to kid actors, but each actor portrayed his character the way a kid should portray his character. Character wise, there was perhaps a little annoyance with the germaphobe kid but that could be passed off because the characters were so intriguing and relatable.
The movies earns it scares too. There aren't any cheap scares either. A couple of "jumps" in the second half, but good jumps. The second half of the movie is full of all the scars, whereas the first half, while still having some screw, focuses more on setting up the characters and the story for the audience while also providing the necessary haunting imagery to imprint in our heads. The way the films opens up, you no there's no holding back with this movie after watching the opening scene.
Bill Skarsgard did a really great job as Pennywise. He was scary, he was menacing, and damn he made me afraid of clowns again. The movie did its job and that is make adults afraid of clowns again.
The movie really boils down to being a horror movie mixed with a coming-of-age drama and I appreciated that. I really like when movies have the balls to go all out like that in a horror movie. Horror movies don't have the guts to pull something like that off (runtime is another thing this movie pulls off really well: 2 hrs. 15 mins as opposed to the average 1 hr and 30 mins. for horror films), and to see something so refreshing and relatable is a breath of fresh air.
I will say "IT" will make my top 10 of the year to this point and I am going to give "IT" an A.
Check out my review on YouTube for a more in-depth analysis here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3LTU525ZHlw