Pet Sematary is an adaptation of the best selling horror novel written by Stephen King. A story about a loving family who relocate from the busy city to a cozy country town with hopes of settling down with the perfect life. Dale Midkiff plays Louis Creed, a local doctor who spends much of his time with his new neighbor Jud played by Fred Gwynne -Herman Munster-.
The family’s new home is nearly perfect, with the exception of the semi’s rushing by the road they live on, and the mysterious cemetery which is deep in the woods behind them. After the death of the family cat Winston Churchill (Church), Jud decides that Louis’s daughter may not be ready to deal with the death of her favorite pet. Jud takes Louis and the dead cat behind the pet cemetery and to an ancient Indian burial ground, where he instucts Louis to place the cat into the ground and wait until morning.
“Nope; ya have to bury your own. I’m gonna go over yander and have a smoke.” ~Fred Gwynne
Soon after Louis learns the powers of the pet cemetery, he is compelled to repeat mistakes of those in the past and place more in the ground to be brought back to life. Little does he know that the earth is sour and all that returns from it is pure evil.
Pet Sematary is not a great movie by any means. I would have to rank it as more of a fan/cult film rather than horror movie greatness. In old Stephen King glory, the story is a good one, but there where many things omitted from the original novel which would have made perfect scares on the big screen.
All in all, Pet Sematary is an alright horror thriller to watch late night. It has a few good frights, a couple of disturbing moments, a kick ass theme by the Ramones, and Fred Gwynne is in it.
“Sometimes, dead is better!”
