31 Days of Horror: Stephen King’s IT

I’m on a Tim Curry kick this week so tonight’s film is the scariest clown film ever made, IT.

Curry has played a lot of strange characters in his film career but Pennywise the clown is by far his best. Now, I may be a bit biased because I am terrified of clowns, but I still cannot walk close to a sewer drain because I fear that he is down there.

Alright, that made no sense if you haven’t seen the film so basically, there is this demon who poses as a clown named Pennywise. This demon feeds off of children’s fears to lure them into a trap and kill them. This group of outcast kids finds a way to destroy the demon but thirty years later, Pennywise comes back and they must return to their home town to destroy him again.

What I was talking about with the sewer is this part where this little boy, Georgie, is outside floating a newspaper boat his brother made for him in the stream of water leading to the sewer drain. He doesn’t catch it in time to stop it from going down into the sewer but, by strange luck, it is rescued by Pennywise the clown who hands it back to him. Along with the boat, Pennywise has a balloon that he offers to Georgie. Then comes the scariest thing I’ve ever heard come out of a clown’s mouth: “Oh yes, they float Georgie, they float….and when you’re down here with me, you’ll float too!” This is followed by him opening his mouth to reveal a mouthful of terrifying sharp teeth.

Pennywise is the stuff that nightmares are made of. Stephen King did an amazing job of creating such a horrifying character. The acting, otherwise, is lackluster but it doesn’t take away from the quality of the film. Obviously you cannot expect top quality acting from actors such as Harry Anderson, John Ritter and Richard Thomas but Tim Curry more than makes up for it.

IT is a must have in any horror collection and on any 31 Days of Horror marathon. I recommend watching it during the day and with a diaper because Pennywise WILL scare the crap out of you.