Month of King: Pet Sematary

MAX:  Hey Mike.

MIKE:  Uh'yuh. 

MAX:  Hey...uh...what is that?

MIKE:  What?  This plastic bag I'm holding?  Oh, just that cat I had found a while back.  Remember?   

MAX:  Oh yeah I remember him.  What happened?

MIKE:  Ran out into a busy intersection?  Ate some poison?   Who knows?  I'm digging a hole for him in this old Indian burial ground that our elderly neighbor showed us a while ago.  He said it can bring the dead back.  Would be pretty cool having a zombie kitty running around, don'cha think? 

MAX:  Yeah, I guess so. But don't you remember the other thing our elderly neighbor told us, Mike? Sometimes dead is better...

MIKE:  That's why I killed him. 

MAX:  What?! You killed our elderly neighbor?

MIKE:  Uh'yuh. 

MIKE:  For the month of September in honor of Stephen King's birthday (Sept, 21st), Max and I are reviewing our favorite movies that have been adapted from King's extensive body of work.  To kick things off we're going to talk about Pet Sematary (1989), one of the scariest films that continue to send chills down our spines whenever we re-watch it.  The movie follows the Creed family who has recently moved to the outskirts of a college town in Maine, and is almost immediately beset with hardship and nightmares.  From the opening credits, as the camera slowly passes by grave stones and makeshift markers of the pet cemetery (spelled Sematary, as seen on the entry sign),  the film succeeds in creating an atmosphere that promises to  lead you down a dark, twisted, road full of terrors beyond your wildest imagination.

MAX:  One way in which I think Pet Sematary definitely succeeds is that, as you said, Mike, the film creates such a strong atmosphere. This movie was actually shot on location in Bangor, Maine, which gives it the exact same small New England town feeling that we get at the beginning of King's book. The setting is very idyllic but right from the get-go, as little Ellie Creed swings on her tire swing, we realize there is something foul in the air. Through her POV, we see her looking toward the twisty path that leads from her backyard and into the pet cemetery. Then the next thing we know, the rope breaks and her tire swing goes plummeting. Ellie is trapped under the tire swing and while her screams distract her parents, Louis and Rachel, Ellie's little brother Gauge goes running towards the busy road. Even though the old neighbor Jud Crandall scoops up Gauge before he can be hit by the oncoming Ornico truck, this scene creates a lot of tense foreshadowing, and we get the idea that maybe the Creeds aren't going to be so happy in this new home after all. It seems like there's some unforeseen force at work that tried to draw Gauge out into the street. And the suggestion of paranormal powers at work is present at every turn of this amazing story. 

MIKE:  Jud, who is played by none other than Herman Munster, Fred Gwynne, is my favorite character in the movie.  Gwynne's delivery as an old New Englander full of wisdom and stories, brings such vitality to the role that it makes you wish you could sit down with him for spell, have a few beers, and just listen to him tell you tales (both good and scary) about the town where he has lived all his life.  When Jud takes the Creed family down to the cemetery, and begins to tell Ellie about the beauty of the place, and that it doesn't have to be scary, rather a restful, hopeful, type of place to visit, it really establishes a contrast of the light and darkness that seems to permeate throughout the movie.  In saying this, Gwynne disarms us viewers to the real nightmare that’s calling out to the Creed family beyond the hallow that separates the cemetery from the "sour ground."

MAX:  Fred Gwynne really is so wonderful in the role of Jud. He humanizes that character in a way that's so personable, I want to move in next door to him. His fantastic delivery of the line, "the soil of a man's heart is stonier" becomes a very eerie refrain throughout the film, in the mind of our lead character, Louis. As the family breadwinner, Louis is the doctor at the local university hospital.  On his first day at work, a student by the name Victor Pascow is hit by a truck and killed. Before he dies, Pascow delivers the same line about a man's heart that Louis hears later from Jud. Pascow (the only "good" supernatural force the Creeds will encounter) is already trying to warn Louis of the danger that faces his family in the space beyond the pet cemetery where "the soil is sour."  Unfortunately, Jud cannot heed this same warning, and upon the death of Ellie's cat, Church, wastes no time introducing Louis to this wondrous place which has always fascinated him. 

MIKE:  The make-up done on the Pascow ghost is great: I love seeing ghosts as decomposing corpses and still scarred from whatever tragic accident befell them.  That's why An American Werewolf in London is one of my all-time favorite films: the way the lead character is constantly haunted by the ghosts of those he killed and maimed as a werewolf are some of the best scenes I've seen in any horror film.  When you see Pascow in all of his mutilated glory, trying to warn Louis of the dangers of the ancient Indian burial ground, I mean, it's unsettling seeing him there, yet he represents the forces of good trying to save the Creed family.  It's this contradicting imagery that makes Pascow such an interesting character.  He appears to Ellie in dreams (though we don't see this), and she's usually crying or terrified by the end of them, but I am not so sure that it's because of the way Pascow looks, rather it's the message that he delivers to her.  In a way, I almost wish we could have seen one of these dreams, just to better understand this and not necessarily just speculate on the point.

MAX:  Yeah, I think it's interesting that they chose to show Pascow as a live presence in the minds of both Louis and Rachel, when it's clearly Ellie who receives his messages the most clearly. Of course if Pascow is the figure of goodness and guidance in this feature (however mangled he might be) then Rachel's deceased sister Zelda is surely his evil antithesis. In a story that is essentially a meditation on death and grief, Zelda represents the most horrific aspect of this idea. Watching this movie alone in the dark, I actually thought of fast forwarding Zelda's first appearance because it scares me so bad. Locked away in her room like a dirty secret, we see through Rachel's flashback the image of her sister rotting and choking to death with spinal meningitis. Rachel, merely a girl at the time, was alone in the house and unable to help as her sister (who was mentally ill at this point) passed away in front of her very eyes. This guilt and fear that Rachel carries related to Zelda is as real and literal as Church, the cat, whose wandered back from the dead after his brief stay in the Indian burial ground. The menace of Zelda's shunned memory is about as literal as the way Church stinks of bad soil, or his eyes, which appear to glow with evil. 

MAX (continued):  The way Church sits perched like a demon on Rachel while she sleeps illustrates more of the foreshadowing I mentioned. He and all the forces in that place beyond the hallow are making a play for death in this family. Rachel thinks she's endured the worst in her sister's ghastly demise. But as Zelda knowingly cackles beyond the grave, there are worse things yet to come for the Creeds.

MIKE:  I think it was just a coincidence of lighting that made the cat's eyes "glow with evil."  My sister's dog’s eyes, at certain angles, glow with evil.  Hmmm.  Come to think of it, I did see her digging around an ancient Indian burial mound the other day, and a few hours later something had come up out of the ground.  Hmmm. 

MIKE (continued):  Anyway, Zelda is just another great example of the stunning special effects and make-up done for this film.  There is a lot of foreshadowing in this film, but the real climax of the drama doesn't start with dreams, it starts with a quiet little picnic with friends and family: a sunny day with Jud and the Creed family on the side of the house; Louis is showing Gauge how to fly a kite, while Ellie impatiently waits her turn "He dropped it! That little shithead."; the adults laugh in surprise to Ellie's outburst, and while the family is distracted Gauge chases after the renegade kite, leading him into the dangerous road that runs in front of the house; a trucker, blasting "Sheena is a Punk Rocker," from the cab of his truck, is barreling down the back road, and doesn't even notice the little boy standing in the middle of it, kite string in hand, until it is too late.  We see a bloody, torn, shoe and the anguished look of total despair from a shock stricken Louis.  That scene catapults us from just a feeling of dread to a real immersion of the horror that follows with Gauge's return from the dead.

MAX:  I remember reading something Stephen King had written in which he recalled an actual incident where his son nearly ran into a busy street.  This incident did not end in tragedy as King realized what was happening and rescued his son in time, but the experience itself sparked the "what if?" that set his writer's mind in motion. From this grain of imagination we get the real pathos of, a Pet Sematary portrait of a father's grief that is so real, it nearly transcends the supernatural element of this story. After all, if it was within their power, what parent wouldn't raise his or her child from the dead? Even with the prior knowledge of the burial ground that Louis has, he still feels compelled to try. He knows that nothing buried there comes back the way it was in life. In the end, that doesn't matter to him. He would rather have a raging possessed corpse for a son than no son at all. How many parents, if put in this fantastical position, wouldn't do the same?

MIKE:  Well, he seems to know that Guage may not come back as he once was, and even goes so far as to make plans to put his son back in his proper burial ground if things should go awry.  With that said, I don't think it's fair to say that he would accept a raging possessed corpse for a son; what Louis hopes for is that his son's spirit, being so young and pure, would surely return to his grief stricken family, and everything would be all right...hopefully.  Even in his perpetual state of grievance (maybe that has something to do with the actor’s inability to express a wide range of emotion) he still has the sense to know that Gauge might not come back as his son.  Would I do what Louis did if I were in the same situation?  I don't know.  I would like to think that my knowledge of all things horror and occult related would kick in, and I'd adhere to the advice of my elderly neighbor, and NOT put my dead child in sour ground.  The soil to a man's heart might be stonier, but I'm not stupid.

MAX:  Well, ok Mr. occult scholar. I'll rephrase my thesis, in that case. Even with the chance that he may have to re-destroy his child, Louis is willing to go ahead and take the risk to bring him back. Why does he do this? Out of "love". Perhaps not the wisest of emotions, but certainly the emotion which flies constantly in the face of our better judgment. If I was in Louis's place I would for sure dig up my boy and bury him in the Mic Mac grounds, because I am stupid, and I've got heart. And I enjoy making impulsive and bad decisions! So you can go to your grave with that. Here's to your bones, bitch. 

MIKE:  Fear is the greatest and oldest of emotions, as H.P. Lovecraft had once pointed out; not Louis or you (very figuratively, we might add, since you're not the "loving dad" type) are acting out of love, rather your judgment is being clouded by the fear of what your life would be like without your child.  It's fear that makes the brightest hearts act upon the most terrible and darkest impulses.

MAX:  Nice. I like that Lovecraft is the inspiration for your love vs. fear debate. Better than quoting Dr. Phil. I think I could concede your point on that one, except that I think it is still necessary to act out of fear sometimes, if only to prove how pathetic and human we really are.  In any case, moving on, I certainly agree that Dale Midkiff did not display a wide enough range of emotion as Louis Creed. It's not really clear how he's feeling as he moves through the end of this movie, because he's playing it rather dead pan, just like he did throughout the whole film.  In fact, sometimes he plays it worse than dead pan and acts like a mopey bitch. Particularly when he's hanging out with Jud. I mean he looks like such a dud. Jud wouldn't hang out with this dud! I have to admit, when Crandal exits the picture and we're left only with Louis in his lone hour, I'm a little bit zoned out. Not completely because the special effects makeup on Gauge is still amazing and there's still plenty of ghoulish goings on in Jud's house…I guess I'm just saying…that guy who played Louis was a little bit lame. 

MIKE:  I’ll completely agree with you.  I think Fred Gwynne is the only reason why I overlook Midkiff's emotionless acting, and that's because Gwynne commands the scene; he isn't overbearing, but Jud is just the best overall character in the film and Gwynne plays him perfectly.

MAX:  Agreed. In the end, it's Fred Gwynne who brings this picture to where it needs to be. All the same, I think there were a number of fun surprises at the end of this film, regardless of Midkiff's bad acting. Not to mention a kick-ass end credits score by the Ramones, the best of which has ever been composed for a horror flick, in my opinion. 

MIKE:  Another dawn approaches, so it's time for us to turn in for the day.  But before we go here are our Bloody Nubs of approval:  I love Pet Sematary.  I will watch this movie over and over again, and every time it gives me the creeps.  I know Zelda is going to cackle and crawl towards the camera, spit dribbling from her mouth, eyes wild with malice; that imagery will give me nightmares for days to come, but I can't seem to help myself.  I'm glad we kicked off our Stephen King tribute with this film, because it is quite possibly the best adaptation of his work that has ever seen a darken theater.  I give Pet Sematary two enthusiastic Bloody Nubs up.

MAX:  I also love Pet Sematary. This is a movie that is very difficult for me to watch alone in the dark, for Zelda related reasons which Mike mentioned (Those scenes really make me think I'm going to pee myself.) All the same, I cannot stop repeatedly watching this movie, because in spite of how scary it is at certain points, it makes me feel good to watch it. Knowing that I'm going to see Fred Gwynne say "uh’yuh" and start going on in that funny dialect of his, always puts a great big smile on my face. There's only a real short list of horror films that make me this "smiley". Creepshow and The Fog would be two of those. I rank this movie up there with those particular classics. It's that good. Two Bloody Nubs all the way up.