Transcript: Pet Sematary Original vs Remake: Christian Perspective on Stephen King's Horror Classic

Jason Lockhart here with you once again. This time around we are in the Halloween season. Yes, the times of goblins and ghosts and all kinds of scary stuff and a time for scary movies. And I love to watch a lot of the old scary movies from back in the day every Halloween. Every Halloween it's part of my monthly routine. I actually start early in September watching a lot of them because I have so many that I love to watch every single year. From the old classics of the old monster movies, universal monster movies, to some of the newer stuff. I love those films. But today I want to talk about one of my favorite Stephen King films of all time Now Stephen King did a lot of films, a lot of his books I should say Have been adapted into films over the years There's one though that stands out out of all of them And I love all of them in their own way Some more than others of course but one stands out as my absolute favorite of all time. I love Misery. I have to say that, so Misery could be right below this one. But the one that stands out as my favorite of all time is Pet Sematary. I absolutely adore this film. I'm telling you, this is probably my favorite of all time. There's something special about this one. But a few years ago, producers came up with an idea to remake this film. I have a hard time sometimes with remakes and reboots and all that type of stuff. If the film is that good, why do we have to remake it? Okay just because technology has come a long way just because there different things just because you know whatever Why do we have to remake everything I just have that problem Well I went ahead and picked it up just to kind of see what all the hullabaloo was all about and see if it stood up to the original. And we're going to talk about that today. But first I want to talk to you about the original Stephen King film, Pet Sematary. tremendously done basically it's about the Creed family a doctor and his wife and his young son and his young daughter that are coming into town new to this town and they buy a little house and right behind the house is a pet cemetery well that's all well and fine but when the family cat gets killed they're going to bury it Jud Crandall, the guy next door, is going to help Lewis Creed bury the young girl's cat in the Pet Sematary. But knowing that it's going to destroy Ellen so bad, he decides to take him beyond Pet Sematary to an old Mi'kmaq Indian burial ground where things come back. But the problem is what you bury there is not what comes back. And what happens is a slippery slope of loss and trying to gain back what is lost. As the cat, they try to bring it back. Well, it doesn't quite come back the nice, kind, loving cat that it once was. So in a very tragic thing, the young boy, the young son of that family, is killed in the road by a big tractor trailer. And Lewis Creed decides, well, the family is having such a difficulty with this. let's do that with the child and see what comes back. Well, as we said, what comes back is not what you bury And it just goes into a complete and total horrifying thing where everything is lost and it is just just it a scary film It really is Probably the greatest part of this film is the great Fred Gwynn who is in this Many know him for playing Herman Munster in the classic TV show, The Munsters. But here he plays Judd Crandall, the next door neighbor and wow what a job does he do in this one it is spectacular probably one of his greatest roles in my opinion of all time i love it now that's can be because i mean he's great as herman munster too but this one is is chilling and spectacular and uh just a great film now what they did was they decided to remake it with pet cemetery this one the um the remake and I will say they did something really, really cool. How do you replace Judd Crandall, Fred Gwynn? How do you replace him? Well, you go and you get another amazing actor, John Lithgow, and that's what you do. Well, let's talk about this now. This film, Pet Sematary, just does not hit the same notes. They mixed everything up. They mixed it all up. They changed it all up. They made it different. The young child, Gage, is not the one that passes away in an accident. It's the young girl. Fred Gwynn from Stephen King's film originally says the term, the ground is sour. And I'm not going to say what it is in the remake, but you can check that out for yourself. It ain't the same. And that term, the ground is sour. Just is amazing. That's an amazing line. What they give us in this one, I'm not even going to say it because it's just almost terrible to even say. It just doesn't have the same pungent feel. It doesn't hit. I don't know. All in all, this film, the Pet Sematary remake, just doesn't hit the right points. It tries very hard. I'll be honest with you. The writers and the actors and all they try very hard John Lithgow does a pretty decent job as Judd Crandall though he can be Fred Gwynn Let's be honest. Nobody can be Fred Gwynn. And that's the problem with remakes, to me, and reboots, is you're always going to try to say, well, this is what they did, and this is what they did. And you can't. I mean, it just, you're always going to be put up against that, and that's just, that's unfair. To me, trying to put these together and trying to say, okay, this one is great, this one is not great, because you're trying to compare them, and it's sad, but that's the point of doing a reboot or a remake. You're always going to be put up against the classic one. You're going to be put up against the original one. And let's be honest, I mean, it's unfair. Of course it is. But that's the idea of doing a remake, and that's what the problem is. Everybody tries really hard in the remake of Pet Sematary. But to me, this one, the original, just holds up so well. Why did we need the remake? Why did we need to do it again? I mean, I've watched this time after time after time. I continue to watch this every single year. And every single year I watch it and I'm still amazed and I'm still awestruck at the special effects. I'm still awestruck with the acting, with the writing, with the directing, with everything. Everything is just so well done that we didn't need this. We didn't need a remake. So why we got it is beyond me. I don't know. This one is just spectacular. It should never have been touched. It should never have been remade, in my opinion. It's just too good. It didn't need it. We want to remind you to go to Classic Cinema Plus. Go there every single day. We've got awesome articles all the time up there. And you can check out our reviews, DVD and Blu-ray reviews, and podcasts and videos and all kinds of stuff up there. As always, see you next time. We wish you a blessed one. and we will see you next time. Bye.