Pet Sematary

Name: Pet Sematary
Genre: Thriller, Horror
Released: April 21, 1989
Duration: 103 min
Rating: 38
Cast: Dale Midkiff, Denise Crosby

1989

METASCORE

Generally unfavorable reviews based on 12 Critic Reviews

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USER SCORE

Mixed or average reviews based on 101 Ratings

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5.1	User Score Mixed or average reviews based on 101 Ratings

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Pet Sematary

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Movie Details & Credits

Paramount Pictures | Release Date: April 21, 1989 | R

Starring: Dale Midkiff, Denise Crosby

Summary: Behind a young family's home in Maine is a terrible secret that holds the power of life after death. When tragedy strikes, the threat of that power soon becomes undeniable.

Director: Mary Lambert

Genre(s): Thriller, Horror

Rating: R

Runtime: 103 min

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Metascore

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Critic Reviews

Kevin Thomas

Gwynne is the anchoring presence as a classically dry, laconic New Englander who seems to know some terrible secret. Elliot Goldenthal has composed a helpfully ominous score, as moody as vintage Bernard Herrmann, and Peter Stein's cinematography is superbly varied, from the bright hues of a glossy magazine to the dark shadows of the charnel house. No question about it, Pet Sematary is a handsomely produced film. Read full review

Bill Cosford

As time goes on, and more King comes to the screen, The Shining, once widely disparaged, looks better and better. At least that film translated some of King's terror; subsequent adaptations, Pet Sematary included, do little more than animate the gore. [24 Apr 1989, p.C6]

Dave Kehr

There is a crazed, dark poetry here, but Mary Lambert's direction of Pet Sematary captures none of it, and the film falls into a flat, frequently laughable literalism. [24 Apr 1989, p.C2]

Jay Scott

Had the film version of Pet Sematary, adapted straightforwardly by King himself from the novel, and directed with horrifying ineptitude by Mary Lambert (Siesta), been any good, it would have been a sizzling shockeroonie, in that it deals, to borrow King's italicized style, with things best left undealt with, notably resurrected murderous children and the terrors instilled by terminal illness. [24 Apr 1989]

Jay Carr

Part of the reason Pet Sematary is so pedestrian is that its leads - Dale Midkiff and Denise Crosby - are uncharismatic. And director Mary Lambert, of Siesta and music video fame, doesn't know how to build and pace her material. [21 Apr 1989, p.46]

Staff (Not Credited)

Pet Sematary marks the first time Stephen King has adapted his own book for the screen, and the result is undead schlock dulled by a slasher-film mentality – squandering its chilling and fertile source material. Read full review

Empire Kim Newman

One of the problems is that King usually writes about cliche subjects so well that you don’t notice the hackneyed aspects of his books, and so when all the character detail, precise backgrounding and elaborate plot setting-up mechanisms are pruned away, all you get is a dumb TV movie with characters doing insanely stupid things to prolong the agony. Read full review

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User Reviews

Horrorseeker

Aug 29, 2019

A disturbing film with scary that are more fresh than we give credit for one of Kings best Adapted novel adaptions

1 of 1 users found this helpful10

JPK

Jul 14, 2019

It’s Fine
Not the perfect King adaptation (That goes to both 1990 and 2017’s IT’s), But it’ll do on a rainy day.

0 of 0 users found this helpful00

TheQuietGamer

Jul 28, 2017

A very faithful adaptation of the novel. It's an almost scene-for-scene recreation of the book's story. I enjoyed seeing my favorite moments from it being brought to life before my very eyes. There are a few minor differences in dialog here and there, and the character Victor Pascow is givenA very faithful adaptation of the novel. It's an almost scene-for-scene recreation of the book's story. I enjoyed seeing my favorite moments from it being brought to life before my very eyes. There are a few minor differences in dialog here and there, and the character Victor Pascow is given a larger role, but the only big change comes from the removal of Jud Crandall's wife. Her role in the story has been given instead to the maid, Missy Dandridge. With the screenplay having been written by Stephen King himself, you can tell this decision was made just so there would be a difference between the book and movie that's a little more distinguishable than the rest. Something more significant to possibly encourage people to check out both versions of the fiction. It ultimately effects very little. The fidelity to the source material guarantees that this movie is sure to be a hit with fans of the novel. The level of success it will find among those who have not read the Stephen King story is more up to question.

When I watched the movie I tried to do so from two perspectives; one as a fan of the book, and one as an outsider who never picked up a copy. While the fan in me was mostly pleased, the part of me that had to view it with out any knowledge of what happened in the book was a little more critical of the flaws. It's not hard to notice how flatly acted the whole thing is. Not hard at all. Our lead Dale Midkiff is the worst offender. He's far too wooden and lifeless. Former sitcom star Fred Gwynne feels a bit too suited for comedy to play a truly great Jud Crandall. In the final act though he really shapes up and shows some true emotion. There are also some poor decisions made with some scenes that rob them of their potential creepiness. For example a few scenes include interactions between a grown man and an obviously lifeless mannequin/doll. These issues could have been in part the fault of either time or budget constraints. Maybe both. Then there's the fact that the movie sort of rushes through the plot of the book. It jumps from major event to major event at occasionally jarring speeds. Never sticking around long enough to really sell the horror or capture the emotions that were on display in the novel. All of these were things that could have handled better if the movie had been in the hands of a better director. I get that there was a lot of material to cover, but some of these mistakes feel amateurish in nature.

Still, the movie has it's creepy moments in it's final act and some of the more potent themes from the book manage to still find their way in here as well. It's even got some pretty great gore effects. So there's still a chance it may appeal to the less literary-inclined out there. And as I've said before, those who have read the book this movie is based on are practically guaranteed to find at least a small level of enjoyment here for the faithfulness alone. Even if they too find it to be unintentionally funny at times or not quite so well-executed in some areas. As it stands, this is definitely among the best adaptations of a Stephen King novel in the exactness department. It just doesn't quite make it alongside the best movies to be born out of one of his works because of it's shortcomings.

7.3/10… Expand

1 of 2 users found this helpful11

RaduA

Apr 4, 2019

65/100

Okay ... that was weird. First of all, I didn't liked the acting (Gage and Jud were the best and Pascow was an annoying character). Secondly ,the makeup, soundtrack and cinematography are ok. The cemeteries look pretty good and Church and Zelda are very creepy. It's meh ...65/100

Okay ... that was weird.
First of all, I didn't liked the acting (Gage and Jud were the best and Pascow was an annoying character).
Secondly ,the makeup, soundtrack and cinematography are ok. The cemeteries look pretty good and Church and Zelda are very creepy.
It's meh ... let's see how good the remake will be (I'm not going to watch the second movie)… Expand

0 of 0 users found this helpful00

FilipeNeto

Jan 17, 2021

Although his writing is generally brilliant, not all of Stephen King's short stories are in fact appealing and interesting. As with all authors, there are smaller works in the middle of their writing and "Pet Sematary" is probably one of them. Even so, this did not prevent three adaptationsAlthough his writing is generally brilliant, not all of Stephen King's short stories are in fact appealing and interesting. As with all authors, there are smaller works in the middle of their writing and "Pet Sematary" is probably one of them. Even so, this did not prevent three adaptations to be made for the cinema. This film, from the late-eighties, is the first of these adaptations and, in my view, the most faithful to the original tale. It is an average film, which does not disappoint us but which is far from being really good.

The script follows King's story with some care: the Creed family has just moved into a country house in order to abandon the stressful routine of urban life, but the house is next to a road with a lot of heavy truck movement, which circulate at high speed and without great care. They immediately become friends with the neighbor across the road, an elderly widower named Jud. It is he who, when asked about a path around the house, introduces them to the Pet Cemetery, where children from the area bury their pets, many of them victims of being run over on the road. Weeks later, when Louis Creed tries to save the life of a young man who dies in his hands after an accident, he is warned by the young man's spirit that he, as well as his family, are in danger. In fact, behind the house, close to the Pet Cemetery, there is an ancient sacred place where the Indians buried their dead, but which was abandoned when it became a cursed place. A place where you shouldn't go, and where the stony soil hides a cruel force.

In general, I liked the film and the story, even though it is considerably weaker than much material I have seen, and which is also based on the tales of this author. The idea of the animal graveyard seems to me more tender than threatening, it is a way to keep alive the memory of the animals we love in life. Furthermore, as the film itself reveals over time, all the horror does not come from this cemetery, but from another, older and more isolated one. The film still has some problems of rhythm since it spends the first 45 minutes in dialogues, back and forth, without actually building solid characters with this effort. In fact, if we exclude Louis Creed, Jud and - surprisingly - the cat, the rest of the characters are limited to the basic and do not allow us to make major psychological analyzes. And that feeling of guilt that Rachel Creed carries because of the death of her sister is something that does not do much for the story told, and it also does not help us to like the character.

The cast is not brilliant, but does a generally satisfactory job. Dale Midkiff was very good in the role of Louis and Denise Crosby is tender as the mother of the family, but Fred Gwynne goes further and really succeeds, with this film, one of the most notable works of the career that, in fact, would end with a few years later. Brad Greenquist gave life to the ghost but if the character was not particularly interesting the same can be said of his work.

Directed by Mary Lambert, it is a lukewarm, irregular film, with a somewhat lazy cast and that suffers from faded, low-contrast and generally ugly cinematography that was taken from the stake in the films of the 1980s. The visual and sound effects are not brilliant, and the sets and costumes are also not particularly surprising, being more or less within what we could expect. Things get much better when the cat comes back, and from now on everything becomes more palatable, bolder and more visually violent. The soundtrack is not in the ear but has good incidental music.… Expand

0 of 0 users found this helpful00

JayDavies

Jul 21, 2020

’d say that after watching this and the 2019 remake, I just don’t think I like the Pet Sematary Story. I mean maybe the book is good but these movies have really strayed me away from ever ready it, the only 1-up this film has on the remake is the excessive amounts of 80s cheese. I wouldn’t’d say that after watching this and the 2019 remake, I just don’t think I like the Pet Sematary Story. I mean maybe the book is good but these movies have really strayed me away from ever ready it, the only 1-up this film has on the remake is the excessive amounts of 80s cheese. I wouldn’t recommend anyone give this a watch, die hard Stephan King fans maybe.

4/10 Jay x… Expand

0 of 0 users found this helpful00

actinium

Apr 7, 2022

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0 of 0 users found this helpful00

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