Proved My Suspicion

Rating: 1/10 (8 March 2020)

Admit to yourselves, those who championed the first re-boot of this that you haven't seen it since. That being said, this is absolute proof your gauge was painfully off the first time. These kids have personalities built into a box and not one person that I cared about more than the 90's "IT" And it wasn't because of Tim Curry. He's great and will never be outdone (sorry kid who played him in this one, you aren't charming enough to be creepy as Curry was). The 90's was pure adult cinema. This is...some video game retro trash.
This movie (if you can call it that) drops us RIGHT at the end of the first chapter. Where they supposedly defeated the being that kills children yet goes into hibernation when the Losers Club thwart Pennywise's spree. 27 years later, their 40's version get called back into action. Here we learn they are all successful, yet do not remember their childhood past in Derry. All the better, since the traumatic events of the first one sent their memory into hiding as well. When called together by Mike Hanlon, they vow to end the terror once and for all.
I truncated the synopsis because...well, the more I think about this one, the more I really hate the people involved.
First, they steal the back and forth between past and present from the 90's version. Yet, somehow, that version was much more effective. This one has that gimmick where they run past their former self. Basically a memory that crisscrosses and such. This novelty wears down fast. And we get bits and pieces of their life as adults.
The 90's version really nailed the sense of their older selves. Again, they did the perfect casting by putting in...known television actors. This was a stroke of genius because the director most likely knew we bring our own baggage with them. Annette O'Toole, Tim Reid, John Ritter, Dennis Christopher, Harry Anderson, Richard Thomas, and Richard Masur. Absolutely brilliant because off the bat you really cared for them (with their history as good people in sitcoms and night dramas and cult films). Similar with their child counterparts.
In 2017 and 2019 "It" I really have no idea who any of these people are. James McAvoy is PAINFULLY mis-casted as Bill Denborough. As is Jessica Chastain as the grown up Beverly Marsh (though curiously, the teenage Bev in the original was bad casting). I never got the sense any of these adults lived a complete life. The abusive father tied to the abusive husband idea is tiresome. In the 90's version it hits you a little harder, since O'Toole played her more as a woman who was abused versus Chastain's baffling take as a woman who is affectionate to her abusive husband.
Any way, it gets REALLY tiresome when Pennywise becomes the spider and the resolution seems tacked on and...well, let's be clear, even Stephen King had no idea what "IT" was. So we get this overly computer generated VERY unscary thing.
There's too much to pick apart. It's just an awful money grab flick that totally lost that charm of fear. This became a dumb actioner, a woke it's okay to be gay thing, and well, it's a modern take. And when the dust settles I was surprised at a nearly 3 hour run time, it still felt like nothing happened.
I feel, these days, when they hand out assignments to make a movie, the statement is "don't screw it up" Life experience truly creates this, and somehow I feel the writer and director both need to live more life to know what makes nostalgia important. It isn't just rattling off pop culture references.