Goddamn Brownies

Being a fan of anything horror related it is hard to go anywhere without someone mentioning Stephen King. He has been a staple of the genre for many years now and has done his share of good work. My only problem with the man lies in his inability to write a decent ending. Pretty much every novel he writes just seems to fall apart when you get to the final act.

Despite his shortcomings I still hold a few of his works in high regard. One such story is It. I read the book in Junior High over the course of a week, and loved it. The whole spider thing is quite odd, but the rest of the story I loved. In 1990 there was a made-for-TV miniseries of the book starring, among many others, Harry Anderson, John Ritter, the late Jonathan Brandis, a young Seth Green and the wonderful portrayal of Pennywise the clown by Tim Curry. What a wonderfully creepy look Curry has as a clown with blood filled balloons.


Today it has come to my attention through many websites (Dread Central, Shock Till You Drop, etc) that there is now a director attached for Warner Bros' remake of It. Dave Kajganich appears to be a first time director, according to IMDb, and has only written a couple of things before, like the 2007 film The Invasion starring Nicole Kidman. Not sure how he will do, but it is not the director who is the cause of my uncertainty.

To begin with, they are going to place the story in present day. Of course! Why must every story take place in this time? Yes I know the book was present day at the time, but all of the stuff that happens in the past (the book jumps between 1958 and 1985) will all have to change. Are the flashbacks going to be around the time of the original's present day? Lame.

Another big problem with this film is the plan to go theatrical. Sure, I would love to see a faithful adaptation on the big screen, but this will not happen. How the hell can they take a 1,000+ page novel and knock it out in two hours? They can't. A couple of years ago there was talk that HBO was going to remake It as a six hour miniseries. This makes sense. This could fix all of the network friendly problems with the first filmed version, aside from the boys pulling a train on Beverly. I don't think even HBO would let preteen gang bangs air.

A story with as much involved as It needs more than a 90 to 120 minute running time. I hope this turns out to be somewhat watchable, but most every remake today is just full of pretty faces to draw a crowd. I'm just afraid of a cast full of actors from Gossip Girl, 90210 and One Tree Hill to litter the screen. Maybe they'll get Will Ferrell to fill the oversized shoes of Pennywise. Sigh.