Stephen King's It (BD)

Classic '90s miniseries, based on Stephen King's horror novel of the same name, is better , in my opinion, than the most recent incarnation. The miniseries tells the story of the Loser's Club and their battle with the force of evil that lives beneath their town. The young cast is a group of mostly unknown actors, except for Jonathan brandis, who do good job portraying the losers club . The older version of those characters are played by a cast of Seventies and Eighties television stars who do just a good job as their younger counterparts. Both groups making us believe in in the fears and horrors they feel when confronted with the evil that lives beneath their town. The star of this miniseries is Tim Curry as pennywise the clown. Mostly known for playing Dr frank-n-furter in The Rocky horror picture show, his turn as pennywise the clown is Master class. If you are not familiar with this version please do yourself a favor and watch.

What at one point was just a good movie has become a reflection of reality for those who understand that there is more to this than meets the eye. Seek the truth, and stand up to the rulers of the shadows of this world. They are Penny Wise. They intimidate from the shadows, seek to isolate, and ultimately destroy the children of the One True High. They fear us, and when united, we destroy the works of the devil. Take up the cross, and follow Him.Oh and the movie rocks.

'IT' is a movie about a group of seven children (who call themselves 'The Loser's Club') who learn that they and the rest of the children in their small 1960's town are being hunted and devoured by an unknown entity. This entity can appear in many forms, including a Leper, a Spider, a loved one, a werewolf or my favorite: as Pennywise the Clown.As if that weren't enough, these poor kids have other problems, too. Bill stutters, his younger brother is murdered in the film, and he feels responsible for it. Ben's dad died and his penniless mother is forced to move them both in with her sister and the sister's annoying son; Ben is overweight, too. Eddie has many 'ailments' (according to his mother, who is overprotective and overbearing due to his father having died of Cancer). Beverly's mom is out of the picture, too, so Beverly lives with her controlling and abusive father, who often hits her and yells at her, she also gets teased at school for being poor. Ritchie is smart and superstitious, and wear thick coke-bottle glasses which he is frequently teased about. Stan's problem is that he can't believe in anything that can't be explained by logic, he also craves routine and doesn't do too well if he finds himself in an unpredictable situation. And finally, Mike. Mike is the only black kid in school and is frequently bullied by the school's racist bullies. Speaking of those bullies: they have it out for each member of The Loser's Club and are relentless.In the first half of 'IT' we meet each Loser as wildly successful adults: Mike (who never left Derry and is the only one who isn't crazy successful) is calling up each Loser, asking them to make good on a promise to return to Derry to fight IT should IT surface again (which IT has). As each Loser gets that call, we see a flashback of their childhood which includes memories of Derry and of each other.The kids are individually terrorized by IT, aka Pennywise the Dancing Clown. He (and I only say 'he' because it is too long to type out 'the entity' every time) is able to sense what each kid is afraid of and uses that to take on a form that will frighten them; fear makes the children taste so much better when he eats them (according to him, anyhow). The kids saw a werewolf movie which scared Ritchie more than he let on. The next day Ritchie goes to school and is sent to find the janitor but instead finds a werewolf. Beverly is afraid of maturing into a woman; she doesn't want her father to see her as a woman because she's afraid of what he'll do to her, so she fears the blood that is associated with becoming a woman - blood that Pennywise splatters all over her bathroom. Eddie is a hypochondriac and so Pennywise appears as a Leper to him (in the book, anyhow, in the movie it is Stan who sees what looks like a Mummy when really it is a bandaged-up Leper). You get the idea. Anyhow, all of the kids band together to kill IT deep underneath the town's sewer system. At the end of part one, they promise to return to Derry if IT ever surfaces again.I really enjoyed the first half of 'IT' because I think that there was a lovely chemistry among the child actors and it seems that their small-town charm in 1960s would have made it a charming place to grow up had it not been for the murderous entity.The second half of 'IT' shows us the reunited Losers, all grown up, and ready to take on IT once again. There's some more childhood flashbacks and some creepy fortune cookie fortunes, there's also a 'Let's stay and fight' and 'No, let's all just go home' back and forth.The second half of 'IT' felt forced. In 1990 when this mini-series came out, a big thing was 'ensemble casts' to draw ratings. Since I was 10 when this first came out, I knew Ritchie and the Judge from the show 'Night Court' and I knew Ben as the guy from the sitcom 'Three's Company.' The rest of the adult Loser cast I'd never seen before. The adult actors had zero chemistry among them, that was so disappointing as compared to their child actor counterparts' chemistry! There's also a super cheesy animatronic spider that was understandable for a 1990 miniseries budget monster, but it was so bad that it took away a lot of the fear that the viewer should be feeling at the climax.I do prefer the first half of this movie 'IT' over the more-recent movies ('IT' and 'IT Chapter Two)' but I will say that the latter do a better job explaining some of the subplots. Of course, the end of 'IT Chapter Two' was also a bit disappointing, because it wasn't true to the novel and did come off as a bit corny, too.

I think of all the "It" movies this is my favorite. You can't top the original. I hadn't seen this movie since it was in theaters. It was great to see it again. All I ever see is the other versions.

Steven king has a morbid imagination.

I absolutely love that feeling of being a little scared and on the edge of my seat while watching a movie that has all the elements of being a good old-fashioned "horror" movie. While I would not go so far as to call "IT" a horror movie, it definitely possesses some of the key ingredients of that type of film. And like with all Stephen King movies, we have a scary and interesting plot, fascinating characters, plenty of thrills, chills and spills and one downright creepy scary-as-hell villain in the form of Pennywise the Clown who has scared the pants off of me since I was 16 years old. This was also a made for tv movie like "Storm Of The Century" so it was not too horribly graphic and yet still scary enough to make me beware of clowns. The setting is a small Maine town where children are starting to disappear or wind up murdered. This was a two-part tv movie event and the first part shows a group of kids in the late 1950's who decide to take on the evil responsible for the missing and murdered children. The second part shows those kids who battled the evil returning 30 years later as adults to battle it again. The cast is an all-star one consisting mostly of veteran tv actors. The story is definitely creepy but not disturbing. Like "Storm Of The Century" this movie is entertaining and is a great example of a respectable scary movie that makes you want to snuggle up with a security blanket and maybe a loved one. I love being scared and this movie definitely frightens. Few other villains have left me scared enough to want to keep the light on and look over my shoulder like Pennywise. He will surely scare the pants off you. And that is such a fun sensation!

Another Stephen King winner and Tim Curry was fantastic as Pennywise. No wonder so many people are afraid of clowns!