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It: Chapter Two Reviews

Because we’re dealing with fairly experienced adults instead of naïve children, the film at times feels more like a trip through an obnoxious carnival hall than journeys of personal growth.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5 | Jul 14, 2024

"It Chapter Two" is less scary; like early "Evil Dead" films and other 1980s horrors, its crazy creatures inspire surprised laughter more than terror.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Feb 14, 2024

Despite the problems of the ending, and being less successful than its predecessor, It: Chapter Two has several stimulating moments through its terror. Likewise, it must be emphasized that it maintains the essence of the literary text.

Full Review | Original Score: 6.5/10 | Jan 27, 2024

It Chapter Two fails to deliver a conclusion worthy of its epic runtime. Even with a phenomenal cast, it isn’t as funny, as scary, or even as captivating as its predecessor.

Full Review | Original Score: C | Jul 24, 2023

It Chapter Two is a good conclusion to the Losers Club story. It definitely has more Stephen King flair than the first film, but gives you everything you’d want from a supernatural horror.

Full Review | Original Score: B | Mar 8, 2023

Amid the repetitive jump scares lies a thoroughly scary and satisfying concluding chapter to Stephen King’s classic story.

Full Review | Oct 27, 2022

Too many things weigh the movie down and keep it from resonating like the first chapter. And too much time is squandered in the wrong places.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5 | Aug 22, 2022

Despite the luxurious 170-minute runtime, Chapter Two feels hastily assembled, oddly brief and bloated at the same time, and beneath the text on which it was based.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | Feb 23, 2022

Episode 48: Ready or Not / It Chapter Two / Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown

Full Review | Original Score: 36/100 | Oct 18, 2021

Muschietti returns to the director's chair to craft a sequel that goes bigger and bolder in every sense, while digging deep into It's mythology, and the dynamic between the adult Losers.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Aug 10, 2021

At two hours and fifty minutes, It Chapter Two is unreasonably long. But it's hard to know what to take out and every section is loaded with memorable action moments.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Jun 22, 2021

The filmmakers made the change in the story worse by indulging in every storytelling whim they wanted, whether it was warranted or not.

Full Review | Feb 18, 2021

Just don't expect to have anything to actually care about.

Full Review | Feb 8, 2021

As fun as it is to see the talented kids back on their bikes for certain scenes of It Chapter Two, the movie is an object lesson in the trickiness of portraying youthful friendships and then translating them into adult roles.

Full Review | Original Score: C+ | Feb 5, 2021

In this sequel Pennywise's red balloon has finally popped.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5 | Jan 31, 2021

Every time [It Chapter Two] has an interesting choice to make, it makes the wrong one

Full Review | Original Score: C | Jan 29, 2021

It's a bit episodic and bloated, but overall it works as a fitting conclusion to the story.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/5 | Dec 30, 2020

The protagonists must stop the creature quickly - but the filmmakers are in no rush to bring this second part to a close.

Full Review | Original Score: 5/10 | Dec 7, 2020

The movie's biggest mistake is its reliance on gore at the expense of narrative clarity. Far too little is said about Pennywise's background, origin or purpose. It's hinted at, but never fleshed out as to why he does what he does or for what reason.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.0/4.0 | Nov 21, 2020

It: Chapter Two isn't freaky enough, or funny enough, and even after spending five hours with this story, it doesn't make us care about the characters enough.

Full Review | Nov 1, 2020

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Film Review: ‘It: Chapter Two’

The clown is back, and the kids have grown up in part two of Stephen King's monster novel, which inspires an overlong, but suitably scary sequel.

By Peter Debruge

Peter Debruge

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How many pages does it take for seven kids to defeat a killer clown? And how many hours does that translate to when adapting the story to screen? For fans of Stephen King, the answer always seems to be “never enough.” The pop pulp shiver-giver inspires in readers a kind of ravenous insatiability that has thwarted his false-alarm retirement and felled more trees than the fires blazing in the Amazon rainforest. That same appetite helped feed the excitement for director Andy Muschietti ’s “It” — a monster hit two years ago, earning more than $700 million — and ought to bring audiences back in even greater numbers for “ It: Chapter Two ,” an elaborate fun-house horror movie that springs pop-up gimmicks and boogie-boogie scares steadily enough to excuse its been-there story and self-important 169-minute running time.

From the “Lord of the Rings” saga to the “Avengers” sequels, length confers a kind of false legitimacy on middlebrow entertainment, no matter the medium. When first published in 1986, “It” was by far the longest-winded of King’s prolix books (outgassing “The Stand” by more than 200 pages), and its sheer heft gave the semblance of significance among the prolific author’s oeuvre, despite the doorstop’s relatively silly plot. Quality was almost irrelevant to the discussion. Teenagers who couldn’t be bothered to read Joseph Conrad’s slender “Heart of Darkness” in English class boasted about having conquered “It” on their own, inevitably touting it as King’s freakiest novel.

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And then they moved on. The fear faded. They forgot. Now, dear reader, it’s time to reunite and confront the specter of those things that frightened us most. At least, that’s the added-value appeal for King devotees, whose experience conceivably mirrors that of his characters: seven adolescent outcasts who dubbed themselves the Losers Club and thought they had vanquished Pennywise (Bill Skarsgård), the supernatural child-killer with the oblong skull, splayed eyes and shark-like grin.

Twenty-seven years after they sent Pennywise back to whatever parallel dimension “It” came from, these unlikely heroes are called upon to make good on the blood oath they took as teens — a device that allows the movie to re-cast its adolescent ensemble as better-known movie stars. Of the group, only Mike (Chosen Jacobs before, now played by Isaiah Mustafa as an adult) has stuck around in Derry, Maine, working at the library, where he can freely obsess about the monster’s origins and how to defeat the creature should It ever return.

Now It has, like some kind of malevolent cicada, with no explanation of how It spent the interval. Instead — and more interestingly — Muschietti catches up with the original protagonists, cycling through where each of them is when they receive Mike’s urgent call. Richie (Bill Hader) has become a stand-up comic. Ever nervous, Eddie (James Ransone) is a natural for a career in risk assessment. A successful novelist, Bill ( James McAvoy , a curious choice) has found work in Hollywood. No longer the tomboy, Beverly ( Jessica Chastain ) married a rich creep, who knocks her around. And Ben (Jay Ryan) has hunked up to become the gang’s unofficial swan, leaving no trace of the misfit duckling (Jeremy Ray Taylor) we knew before.

Credit the hair and wardrobe team for an uncanny job matching the kids’ earlier look, good for a few bonus laughs as the adult stars channel their younger counterparts’ more colorful idiosyncrasies (Ransone is a ringer for Jack Dylan Grazer’s already spazzy antics, Hader amplifies Finn Wolfhard’s goggle-eyed awkwardness). The teenagers get a fair amount of screen time here, too, dragging out the second act with flashbacks as each recalls — and is forced to reckon with — those personal It-related encounters they banished from their memories when they moved away. Young Bill (Jaeden Martell) still blames himself for his brother’s death, Beverly (Sophia Lillis) realizes where her attraction to abusive men comes from, and so on.

As often happens with small-town escapees, their lives have changed far more than the place they left behind — although the movie omits some key details on how Derry has fared in their absence: Have no other children died during that time? Were no murders committed? Have the sewers smelled only of roses? Depriving us of answers, director Muschietti skips the intervening decades, opening “Chapter Two” with a horrific gay-bashing scene — a hate crime that’s true to the book and to Maine history (see the 1984 murder of Charlie Howard) but confusing in this context. Was it the sheer evil of this attack that brought Pennywise back? Did the clown somehow cause the incident (in which queer auteur Xavier Dolan plays the victim)? Or did It merely show up to deliver the finishing blow?

It’s a hard scene to stomach in a film that doesn’t feature all that many killings — certainly fewer than one would expect, and none as unnervingly realistic as the one depicted here. What happens to the perpetrators of this awful event? Clearly the news — paired with a red balloon and the words “Come Home” scrawled in blood under the bridge — was enough to convince Mike that Pennywise was back. But why, after upsetting us so, would the film let these homophobes go, unpunished and ignored for the rest of the film?

Muschietti has a strange narrative challenge to overcome here: On one hand, he’s obliged to compress all the plot that King could indulge in more than 1,100 pages (which explains why other killings and the local police’s dead-end investigations don’t make the cut), while on the other, he’s motivated to delay the final confrontation between Pennywise and the reunited Losers Club for as long as possible.

Nearly all the scares that follow are hallucinatory in nature, most of them sight gags made possible by CGI: Tiny digital monsters burst out of fortune cookies at a Chinese restaurant; a Paul Bunyan statue lumbers cartoonishly after Richie with his giant ax; virtual spider legs sprout from an old friend’s decapitated head, skittering around like something out of John Carpenter’s “The Thing” (a lot of the movie’s Lovecraft-ian moments owe a debt to that film, which achieved its trippy creature transformations practically). Spending too much time in flashbacks is risky, despite the creative “A Nightmare on Elm Street”-style surrealism, since audiences already know these characters don’t die as kids.

But King has saddled the director with an even bigger problem: At a certain point, the novel goes off the rails, veering beyond the merely supernatural into full-blown metaphysical mumbo-jumbo (enter King’s cosmic space turtle, the Matubin, and other “macroverse” oddities). The movie has almost no choice but to rethink the final act, anticipating the overhaul by way of a running joke. As the group’s resident novelist-screenwriter, Bill is teased constantly for not being able to write a satisfying ending. King has often suffered the same criticism. Can this movie fix the fact the book ends badly?

Yes, it can. “It: Chapter Two” is much longer than it needs to be, but it builds to something significant — and a lot of that filler feels justifiable in terms of how audiences’ consumption patterns are changing. Whereas the three-hour 1990 miniseries version was split across two nights, viewers now binge an entire season of “Stranger Things” — a shameless “It” knockoff that improves on King’s novel — in a single weekend. In retrospect, it’s easy to see that the 2017 film (already long at 135 minutes) was just a glorified trailer for this movie. Still, Muschietti could have used “It” to launch a franchise or an open-ended TV series, but instead, he recognizes the value in closure.

In a way, closure is what “It” is all about: You start something as kids, and then life happens. You lose interest, or confidence, or maybe just your nerve. Such evasion is a kind of fear, and one that King confronted head-on with this novel. It’s as if he’s daring you to come back and see how much worse It can get. And Muschietti obliges, embellishing the childish phobias we thought we’d outgrown en route to defeating that creepy, fearmongering clown once and for all.

Reviewed at Regency Village Theatre, Los Angeles, Aug. 26, 2019. MPAA Rating: R. Running time: 169 MIN.

Production: A Warner Bros. release of a New Line Cinema presentation of a Double Dream, Vertigo Entertainment, Rideback production. Producers: Barbara Muschietti, Dan Lin, Roy Lee. Executive producers: Richard Brener, Dave Neustadter, Gary Dauberman, Marty Ewing, Seth Grahame-Smith, David Katzenberg.
Crew: Director: Andy Muschietti. Screenplay: Gary Dauberman, based on the novel “It” by Stephen King. Camera (color): Checco Varese. Editor: Jason Ballantine. Music: Benjamin Wallfisch.
With: James McAvoy, Jessica Chastain, Bill Hader, Isaiah Mustafa, Jay Ryan, James Ransone, Andy Bean , Jaeden Martell, Wyatt Oleff, Jack Dylan Grazer, Finn Wolfhard, Sophia Lillis, Chosen Jacobs, Jeremy Ray Taylor, Bill Skarsgård.

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It Chapter Two Review

06 Sep 2019

It: Chapter Two

It Chapter One , or whatever we must call it since it made enough millions to birth a chapter two, had its crutches. This was an adaptation of (half of) a beloved book, following in the footsteps of a so-so yet affectionately remembered TV movie, leaning heavily into the never-ending wave of 1980s nostalgia. It all seemed a little safe, never completely its own entity.

Yet it overcame this. As Amblin-lite as it was, It starred a winning cast of kids and went to town with classic Stephen King explorations of domestic trauma. And while never totally terrifying, it boasted a boogeyman for the ages, Bill Skarsgård wearing Pennywise like a second skin. A horror with heart, It stormed the cinema gates, and the novel’s second timeline, featuring the Losers grown up and back on the clown-conquering beat, was aggressively greenlit. And now, director Andy Muschietti ’s shackles are off.

It Chapter Two is all about crutches. A quick recap of the first film’s epilogue is followed by some voiceover from the adult Mike ( Mustafa ). “Sometimes, we are what we wish we could forget,” he says. Mike has remained in Derry, but in the 27 years since, the rest of the Losers have split, none of them in touch with each other, all having moved on. In some ways, at least.

The adult Losers get great intros, Muschietti and screenwriter Gary Dauberman presenting distinct personalities in precise sequences: having been out of contact for three decades, Mike, obsessed with events throughout, telephones them all with grim news from Derry, resulting in puking, car-crashing and all-round panic. From Bill Hader ’s Richie, now professionally wisecracking on comedy stages, to Jessica Chastain ’s Beverly, still sadly suffering abuse, to James McAvoy ’s sensitive screenwriter Bill, the success of every re-casting is immediately apparent — all of these characters feel instantly lived-in, vibrant, authentic human beings who you buy from the off.

It is glorious to see this stuff envisioned on such a huge and self-assured scale, a joy to have a film of this size trading in this sort of genre carnage with such uncompromising and unapologetic style.

But there the comfort ends. Before we reunite with the Losers, the film itself begins in Derry with a brutal, bone-crunching homophobic attack. More disturbing than anything in chapter one, it announces at once that Muschietti is not playing it safe at all. It is decidedly adult territory, enormously troubling to witness, let alone when it’s married to an even more gruesome, otherworldly coda. This opening does everything horror should do, leaving you shaken mere minutes after the film has begun. Muschietti more-or-less keeps this going throughout its near three-hour runtime.

Genre-wise, Chapter Two delights in itself, just as the book did. King conceived It as a “final exam on horror”, throwing in all the monsters people were afraid of when he was growing up. Muschietti seems equally in debt to decades of cinematic horror, 1970s and 1980s films being particular influences. There are exquisitely executed scares with the various ghouls, from unsettling background spine-chillers to full-force frightmares. It is both classy and disgusting, the creature design wonderfully inventive, all in the service of scaring you. These, though, are the sideshows. Mere supporting acts for a horrendous headliner.

Pennywise is a real motherfucker in this film. An absolute horrible bastard of a clown. His first appearance is surprisingly nasty, and then so are all the others. Much of his heightened impact here is because more of Skarsgård has been allowed to shine through. This is Heath Ledger -levels of character ownership. A brilliant physical performer, he inhabits Pennywise to diabolical degrees, and the effects, both practical and computer-generated, are next-level — at one point one of his eyes is slightly off, and it’s creepy as hell. Yet in another sequence, he appears without any prosthetics at all, just Skarsgård in ghoulish whiteface, and it’s absurdly horrid. He’s just as scary laid bare.

This film is not a deep psychological excavation, but that’s fine — it’s as deep as it needs to be. It’s about dealing with your shit, about confronting the things you haven’t let go, the things you’ve suppressed, avoided, run from. Pennywise preys on these personal demons, in ways that are much more elemental than before. Muschietti explored childhood fears with the first film, but the sequel steps things up — there are now years of trauma for Pennywise to poke at. There is more meanness to his tapping into the Losers’ troubles, and their nightmarish excursions feel much more embedded in the story. There was a disconnect to the set-pieces in the first film, but here Pennywise is more integrated, more overtly involved in it all.

It all reminds you of how good Stephen King is at this stuff. As much as Muschietti comes into his own with this film, it is nevertheless constantly bubbling over with King’s DNA, and whilst Muschietti tightens the book’s focus, he doesn’t cut corners. That threatens to derail it as things progress. With seven Losers, and two versions of each over two timelines — there are flashbacks throughout — there is a lot to wrangle. King intentionally took a kitchen-sink approach with the book, hence its 1,138 pages. Muschietti makes it work — his flashbacks complement the present day, the two periods dancing with each other, illuminating each other, beefing up the emotional resonance — but at one point the film feels like it might wear itself out a smidge. And as it heads into a more fantastical arena, it feels in danger of buckling under the weight of its own silliness.

But. Then. Just as it seems it might be on the verge of losing itself, as the book dictates, it goes fabulously apeshit. What madness it brings. As the film builds towards a nutty climax, there is a whole heap of Grand Guignol insanity, with unashamedly grand, godlike images. It is glorious to see this stuff envisioned on such a huge and self-assured scale, a joy to have a film of this size trading in this sort of genre carnage with such uncompromising and unapologetic style.

Confidence runs through Chapter Two . The (almost) contemporary setting means it’s less burdened by superficial nostalgia, allowing Muschietti to more forcefully own it, and it’s tonally perfect. Comedy aside — humour often undercuts the horror, mostly successfully — there is little brightness here, the film shrouded in shadow. Everything conspires to creep you out. Nothing is spared with the set design, especially as things get weird: you can taste the dankness. It is unforgivingly tense, giving you both shivers and jumps. It is spooky on a gut level.

Yet for all the darkness, the sweetness survives. The film has much affection for these Losers, and as an ode to friendship — or at least to age-old bonds — it does fine work. With so many leads, the emotion is handled economically, but sincerely. Muschietti walks a constant tightrope. He never falls off.

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‘It Chapter Two ’ Review : Send in the Clown, Again

He’s already here.

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‘It Chapter Two’ | Anatomy of a Scene

The director andy muschietti discusses a sequence from his film featuring james mcavoy..

“I’m Andy Muschietti, director of ‘It Chapter Two.’ So this is the moment where all the Losers separate unwillingly. And this is the scene where we find Bill Denbrough— James McAvoy plays Bill Denbrough— just as after he recovered his bicycle, Silver. This is a great scene, because we summarize a little bit in this escalation from not being able to ride his bicycle to actually getting a grip on it and riding it like a champion. We sort of illustrate how the adult turns into the child again.” “Hi-ho, Silver! Away!” “And very soon he arrives to the house where he used to live and another memory hits. And it’s the memory of that infamous day where he sent Georgie away with a boat. That’s a scene that we took from the first movie. So the scene changes mood a little bit. The mood is now a little darker. We know what happened after that. But it’s a memory that has been pushed down and pushed down. But the intention with the scene is to like slowly lure the audience into this memory at the same time that it’s happening on the mind of the character. There’s a transition that you can see when McAvoy first arrives to the storm drain and looks at the storm drain. He drops the bike, and the drop of the bike takes us to the past.” “Billy, don’t leave!” “Hello?” “The scene continues. We see McAvoy talking to a Georgie there. I say ‘a Georgie,’ because at this point, we know that Georgie isn’t Georgie anymore. Georgie has been gone for a long time. But because Pennywise is playing with his feelings, he lures him into the illusion that Georgie is still there. Everything that is shot from the outside is location. It’s shot on the street. Everything that is from the inside out, when the camera is inside the storm drain, was shot on stage.” “Take my hand.” “Billy, please.” “I’ve got you. Come on!” “He’s coming!” “Take my hand!” “Billy!” “Come on! Take my hand!” “I wanted specifically to make this a visual effects shot. As a reference, we had some hands of small performers that we used as a reference. The whole swarming is divided in three shots, and it’s pretty creepy.” [LAUGHING] “I hate you! I hate you.”

By A.O. Scott

The chatter from the Venice Film Festival last weekend was all about “The Joker.” Masterpiece or menace? You can decide for yourself after Oct. 4, when that movie opens, but if you need some killer-clown action in the meantime, you’re welcome to “It Chapter Two.”

Two years after the first “It” — and 27 years after the events depicted therein — the seven youngsters who faced down evil in the nightmare-ridden, postcard-pretty town of Derry, Me., reunite for another battle. Like a diabolical cicada, Pennywise the Clown — or rather the supernatural force whose principal avatar he is — has emerged from a period of dormancy, bringing his wheedling, lethal psychological manipulation to a new generation of victims.

The first horror we witness in “Chapter Two” — a murderous homophobic attack during a carnival — is something Pennywise ( Bill Skarsgard ) exploits rather than perpetrates, and it serves as a reminder that the otherworldly cruelty he represents is not the only kind. Pennywise, who sometimes takes the form of a giant spider-like monster, and whose pouty moue can suddenly sprout rows of sharp, brownish fangs, both feeds and feeds upon ordinary human viciousness.

That connection between the banal and the cosmic — the two-way metaphorical street that makes Derry a kind of World Heritage Site for terror — is central to the imagination of Stephen King, whose book is the source of both chapters of “It” (and the earlier made-for-television version). The director, Andy Muschietti , and the screenwriter, Gary Dauberman , have taken some narrative liberties, but they remain true to some of King’s major ideas: about how innocence can be corrupted and preserved by knowledge; about the hidden pathways between the unconscious and the natural world; about the ethical power of friendship. King’s brief on-screen appearance (playing the curmudgeonly proprietor of an antique store) can be taken as a seal of approval.

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It chapter two.

Common Sense Says
Parents Say 115 Reviews
Kids Say 272 Reviews

Common Sense Media Review

Fewer scares, plenty of blood in long but fun sequel.

Parents Need to Know

Why Age 15+?

Scary clown attacks, biting and chomping children with huge, oversized teeth. Ma

Very strong, frequent language, with many uses of "f--k" and "s--t," plus "mothe

Both opposite- and same-sex kissing; a woman kisses two men, the first after a m

Adult characters drink together socially; mild drunkenness. Cigarette smoking, i

Mention of Facebook; Ford Mustang and Chevy Tahoe are featured.

Any Positive Content?

Though it takes a while to get everyone convinced and on board with what has to

Though the characters are generally lovable and tend to show bravery when the mo

Violence & Scariness

Scary clown attacks, biting and chomping children with huge, oversized teeth. Many scary creatures attacking. Lots of blood. In a hate crime, bullies beat and kick a gay character, smashing his face (lots of blood) and throwing him over a bridge. An abusive husband slaps/punches his wife, hits her with belt; she hits back, smashing his head with a blunt object. Character dies via suicide; shown in bathtub with bloody wrists. Characters stabbed in the face and the chest. Decomposed bodies. Extracted and squished heart. Flashback to abusive father. A character uses a gun to "shoot" a younger version of himself in a scary fantasy sequence.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Violence & Scariness in your kid's entertainment guide.

Very strong, frequent language, with many uses of "f--k" and "s--t," plus "motherf----r," "a--hole," "p---y," "bitch," "hell," "d--k," "f--got," "prick," "vagina," "beaver," "you suck," "goddamn," "oh my God," and "Jesus Christ" (as exclamations).

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Language in your kid's entertainment guide.

Sex, Romance & Nudity

Both opposite- and same-sex kissing; a woman kisses two men, the first after a mistaken assumption. Brief sex-related talk. Non-sexual nudity includes a man's back and butt as he gets into a bath and a giant, naked CGI woman attacking a character.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Sex, Romance & Nudity in your kid's entertainment guide.

Drinking, Drugs & Smoking

Adult characters drink together socially; mild drunkenness. Cigarette smoking, including by a teen. Mention of characters being crackheads. Drug trip sequence in which a character is given hallucinogenic root and has a "vision."

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Drinking, Drugs & Smoking in your kid's entertainment guide.

Products & Purchases

Positive messages.

Though it takes a while to get everyone convinced and on board with what has to be done, it turns out that teamwork is essential for the characters to survive. Only when they stick together do they have the power to face the clown's attacks.

Positive Role Models

Though the characters are generally lovable and tend to show bravery when the moment truly counts, they're also deeply flawed, rather messed-up adults, and not exactly role models.

Parents need to know that It Chapter Two is the follow-up to the hugely successful It (2017); both films are based on Stephen King 's novel. This one -- which is more centered on adults than kids -- is very long and less scary than the first, but it's definitely entertaining, with great characters and true teamwork. Violence/horror is very strong, with a shocking hate crime (bullies beat up a gay couple), a man abusing his wife (she hits back), and a character dying via suicide, as well as large amounts of blood and terrifying monster attacks. Children are skewered by oversized teeth, characters are stabbed with knives, and a gun is used in a scary fantasy scene. Language is also heavy, with multiple uses of "f--k," "s--t," and more. Characters kiss, and there's some sex-related talk. Adult characters drink socially, and smoking (including by a teen) is shown. A brief "drug trip" sequence involves a hallucinogenic root. Bill Skarsgård returns as Pennywise; Isaiah Mustafa , James McAvoy , Jessica Chastain , and Bill Hader co-star. To stay in the loop on more movies like this, you can sign up for weekly Family Movie Night emails .

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Based on 115 parent reviews

It chapter 2!

I think its the best movie, what's the story.

Twenty-seven years have passed since the events of It , and there's evidence of Pennywise's return. So in IT CHAPTER TWO, Mike ( Isaiah Mustafa ), who has stayed in Derry, Maine, calls his old friends to make good on their pact. Five of them -- Bill ( James McAvoy ), Bev ( Jessica Chastain ), Richie ( Bill Hader ), Eddie ( James Ransone ), and Ben ( Jay Ryan ) -- show up, though they don't remember much of what happened back in 1989 and aren't thrilled to discover that they're meant to risk their lives again. Mike tells them that they must find "tokens" from that summer, important objects to be used in a ritual to send Pennywise ( Bill Skarsgård ) away forever. As memories come flooding back, and as the evil clown's attacks become fiercer, it begins to look as if they might not make it -- unless they can stick together.

Is It Any Good?

This nearly three-hour sequel has well-rounded, appealing characters and even some laughs, but it lacks the nerve-rattling scares and appealing simplicity of its 2017 predecessor. It Chapter Two stumbles a bit at the start; it doesn't draw clear lines connecting the younger actors and the older ones, and aside from the spot-on casting of Hader and Ransone and the fact that Chastain is the only woman, it takes a little time to get everyone straight. But then the long sequences of reuniting, balking at danger, and experiencing flashbacks and Pennywise attacks actually succeed at making our lovable Losers come together more like a family.

Teamwork is important here: Every time the group splits up, they grow weaker against Pennywise's scares. And even though Hader steals nearly every scene he's in (just as his younger counterpart, Finn Wolfhard , did in It ), and his juvenile bickering with Ransone is hilarious, each member of the group becomes equally important. The horrors here seem more likely to cause shocked laughter than screams, perhaps because of the more complex adult targets, and It Chapter Two is viscerally a teeny bit less satisfying than its predecessor. But in the end, the characters win the day, and they most certainly turn into folks you'd want on your side when the clowns come creeping in the dark.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

Families can talk about It Chapter Two 's violence . Which scenes were shocking, and which were entertaining? What was the difference? What's the impact of media violence on kids?

Is the movie scary ? How does it compare to the first one in that respect? What's the appeal of scary movies?

How does teamwork help the characters to survive? How do they learn about the benefits of teamwork?

How does this movie compare to the book? To the miniseries ?

What makes friends sometimes drift apart from each other as they grow up? Has that ever happened to you?

Movie Details

In theaters : September 6, 2019
On DVD or streaming : December 10, 2019
Cast : James McAvoy , Jessica Chastain , Bill Skarsgård , Bill Hader
Director : Andres Muschietti
Inclusion Information : Female actors
Studio : New Line Cinema
Genre : Horror
Topics : Book Characters , Monsters, Ghosts, and Vampires
Run time : 169 minutes
MPAA rating : R
MPAA explanation : disturbing content and bloody images throughout, pervasive language, some crude sexual material
Last updated : August 12, 2024

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It chapter two review: a satisfying end to stephen king's story.

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IT's Losers Club Actors Reunite 5 Years After Stephen King Adaptation (Minus 3 Members)

5 years ago, three star wars stars from all over the galaxy united for this netflix heist movie, beetlejuice beetlejuice review: sequel pitfalls can’t keep down tim burton’s most joyful movie in years [venice], it chapter two is a compelling and satisfying ending to stephen king's story, even if it's not quite as charming or scary and feels a bit overlong..

When IT released in 2017, Warner Bros' film was an all-around success, earning rave reviews and going on to become one of the highest grossing movies of the year - even though it only adapted half of the book on which it's based. Now, Warner Bros. brings fans the conclusion of the story with IT Chapter Two . Director Andy Muschietti returns for the sequel, as does one of the first film's screenwriters, Gary Dauberman ( IT was written by Dauberman, Cary Fukunaga and Chase Palmer). The IT sequel follows the adult versions of the Losers Club as they return to Derry 27 years after the events of the first movie to take on It once again. IT Chapter Two is a compelling and satisfying ending to Stephen King's story, even if it's not quite as charming or scary and feels a bit overlong.

IT Chapter Two picks up 27 years after the Losers Club initially defeated Pennywise (Bill Skarsgård), with the kids now grown up and most living elsewhere. However, when Mike Hanlon (Isaiah Mustafa) - the only one to remain in Derry - recognizes the signs of It's return, he calls the others and asks them to come back and make good on the oath they swore in 1989. Though they've all largely forgotten Derry and It, the majority of the Losers return, including Bill Denbrough (James McAvoy), Beverly Marsh (Jessica Chastain), Ben Hanscom (Jay Ryan), Richie Tozier (Bill Hader) and Eddie Kaspbrak (James Ransome). As the Losers Club members' memories start coming back, they must wrangle with the trauma they endured as kids and try to defeat It once and for all.

Bill Skarsgård as Pennywise in IT Chapter Two

Whereas IT was a coming of age parable featuring a group of kids on the cusp of growing up, IT Chapter Two somewhat clumsily shifts the focus to their adult counterparts and the difficulty of dealing with past trauma. Whether due to a lack of finesse in Dauberman's script or the shift in focus proving to be too much of a challenge, IT Chapter Two 's handling of its story and themes isn't as sophisticated as IT . Rather, IT Chapter Two relies too heavily on expositional dialogue and telling the viewer, rather than showing them (or, in some cases, telling and showing them). Thankfully, IT Chapter Two has a stellar cast to fall back on, with McAvoy and Chastain doing much of the emotional heavy lifting - though even they struggle at times to rein the movie in from going full melodrama. Hader, too, turns in a compelling performance, stealing much of the show from his fellow castmates.

Still, IT Chapter Two flounders a bit with its horror, undercutting many of the film's creepy visuals with jokes. These jokes, delivered skillfully by Hader and Ransome particularly, bring levity to what would otherwise be uninterrupted terror, but they detract from the scariness of the movie. There's also a disconnect between the very human violence of the movie - which includes a homophobic attack and a scene in which Bev is abused by her husband, both very early on in the film - and the fantastic elements of It trying to scare the Losers. Certainly, there are moments that are undeniably scary when It manifests disturbing creatures or sticks the adults in situations that bring their greatest fears to life. But, often it feels as though IT Chapter Two must choose to go either for the low-hanging fruit of jump scares or more thematically relevant creepy situations, at times failing to provide horror that is both scary and furthers the themes and character development of the movie.

Jeremy Ray Taylor, Jack Dylan Grazer, Sophia Lillis, Wyatt Oleff, Jaeden Lieberher, Finn Wolfhard and Chosen Jacobs in IT Chapter Two

That's not to say IT Chapter Two will disappoint fans of King's book and of Muschietti's 2017 film. Altogether, the film delivers a satisfying second and concluding chapter to the story of the Losers Club - though it takes nearly three hours to do so. With sequences that lag even as they offer important character development, it's clear Muschietti needed all 169 minutes, but could have used them a little more efficiently. Further, the levity brought to IT Chapter Two with its jokes might make the movie that much more appealing to general viewers, balancing horror with humor so as not to be too scary (though that might just as easily anger or alienate more hardcore horror fans). Still, even as Chapter Two works well enough on its own, it doesn't quite stack up to its predecessor, losing some of the charm and nostalgia that IT embodies.

Ultimately, IT Chapter Two isn't quite as good as IT was, and may have trouble living up to the expectations that have been building over the past two years. It's not as skillfully written nor is the story as thematically strong, though the visuals are striking and it does pack in a fair amount of scares. While IT Chapter Two has its flaws, it still comes from (almost) the same creative team, meaning that while the story necessitates certain departures from what worked in IT , Muschietti and Dauberman manage to bring throughlines that evolve the characters and franchise in a way that's both gratifying and fascinating. As such, IT Chapter Two is a must-watch for fans of IT and King, and is an altogether entertaining viewing experience even for those that may not be fans of the horror genre.

IT Chapter Two is now playing in U.S. theaters. It is 169 minutes long and rated R for disturbing violent content and bloody images throughout, pervasive language, and some crude sexual material.

Let us know what you thought of the film in the comments section!

It Chapter Two

Every 27 years, evil revisits the town of Derry, Maine. It: Chapter Two brings the characters—who have long since gone their separate ways—back together as adults, nearly three decades after the events of the first film. Together, the reunited Losers Club might have a chance to stop Pennywise once and for all.

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It Chapter Two review: Pennywise is back in brilliantly creepy horror sequel

We'll all float again.

Of course fans of Stephen King's classic horrifying coming-of-age novel (or the 1990 miniseries) knew that Andy Muschietti's movie was only half the story, smartly separating the novel's dual timelines and focusing on the young Losers' Club. Critical acclaim and a terrific $700 million box office haul followed, and It Chapter Two was born.

But could Muschietti repeat the terrifying magic again with a whole new cast? Without a doubt. Creepy, affecting and brilliantly crafted, It Chapter Two is a sequel that lives up to expectations.

preview for IT Chapter Two - final trailer (Warner Bros.)

Opening with the Losers' Club making their pact at the end of the first movie, It Chapter Two jumps ahead 27 years as Pennywise (Bill Skarsgård) starts to terrorise the town of Derry once again.

After the traumatic events of their childhood, the Losers' Club have all moved out of Derry, except for Mike (Isaiah Mustafa) who's been preparing for Pennywise's return. With the children of Derry disappearing, Mike is left with no choice but to call his fellow Losers and get them to return home.

Together, they must confront Pennywise once again and conquer their darkest fears to defeat him for good...

Although the sequel starts with the young Losers' Club, the majority of It Chapter Two is focused on the grown-up Losers, and it's quite remarkable how well they've been cast. Not only do they look like believable adult versions of the Losers, but the performances manage to evoke the same mannerisms and spirit established in the first movie. You have no doubt you're watching the same characters.

Bill Hader, Jessica Chastain, James McAvoy, James Ransone, Isaiah Mustafa, Jay Ryan, IT Chapter 2

James McAvoy and Jessica Chastain are as reliable as ever and there's not really a weak link among them, but special credit has to go to Bill Hader and James Ransone. Like Finn Wolfhard and Jack Dylan Grazer in the first movie, the two are faced with balancing humour with genuine terror, and they manage it with aplomb. Their relationship gives It Chapter Two an unexpected emotion to go with the scares.

But you're not really coming to It Chapter Two for its heart, even though you definitely care about every Loser. Like in the first movie, Muschietti has managed to craft a series of chilling set pieces designed to give everyone a touch of coulrophobia. Pennywise is both more vicious and creepier than before, with Bill Skarsgård absolutely captivating, as much as you might want to look away.

While there's nothing in the sequel that a die-hard horror fan won't have seen before, the set pieces are so effectively done that they'll have an impact regardless. From a terrific hall of mirrors sequence to the terrifying old lady seen in the first trailer , there are creepy delights to savour throughout, including some classic book moments that have been brilliantly realised.

As in the novel, the adult Losers have to revisit their childhoods in Derry to stop Pennywise. The flashbacks are seamlessly blended with the present day and you do get to see more of the talented young cast, but it's here where the scares get a bit repetitive. You're seeing the same 'mission' play out across each Loser, with the end result largely being a variation of a similar beat, diminishing their impact somewhat.

Fortunately this only really affects this section of the movie, which is otherwise smartly paced across its hefty 169-minute runtime . It really doesn't feel that long and, crucially, never feels overstuffed as Chapter One left a lot of King's novel still to explore. One notable subplot has been dismissed entirely for the better, and although some other adjustments may prove divisive for fans, It Chapter Two is a worthy adaptation.

Not only does It Chapter Two live up to that seminal novel but also to the standards set in the first movie. The cast might be different but the heart and horror remain as strong as before. Pennywise missed the Losers' Club – and we missed him too.

It Chapter Two is out now.

Director: Andy Muschietti ; Starring: James McAvoy, Jessica Chastain, Bill Hader, Isaiah Mustafa, James Ransone, Bill Skarsgård, Sophia Lillis, Finn Wolfhard, Jack Dylan Grazer ; Running time: 169 minutes; Certificate: 15

Funko Pop! IT Pennywise with Wrought Iron EXC Pop! Vinyl Figure

Warner Bros IT [Blu-ray + Digital Download] [2017]

Funko Pop! IT Funko Pop! Keyring Gift Set

Funko Pop! IT Pennywise with Boat Pop! Vinyl Figure

Warner Bros Stephen King's It [Blu-ray] [2016] [Region Free]

Funko Pop! IT Bill with Flashlight Pop! Vinyl Figure

Funko Pop! IT Pennywise (Classic Black & White) EXC Pop! Vinyl Figure

Hodder Paperbacks It by Stephen King

Funko Pop! IT Beverly with Key Necklace Pop! Vinyl Figure

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Funko Pop! It Chapter 2 Pennywise 10-Inch Pop! Vinyl Figure

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Movies Editor, Digital Spy Ian has more than 10 years of movies journalism experience as a writer and editor. Starting out as an intern at trade bible Screen International, he was promoted to report and analyse UK box-office results, as well as carving his own niche with horror movies , attending genre festivals around the world. After moving to Digital Spy , initially as a TV writer, he was nominated for New Digital Talent of the Year at the PPA Digital Awards. He became Movies Editor in 2019, in which role he has interviewed 100s of stars, including Chris Hemsworth, Florence Pugh, Keanu Reeves, Idris Elba and Olivia Colman, become a human encyclopedia for Marvel and appeared as an expert guest on BBC News and on-stage at MCM Comic-Con. Where he can, he continues to push his horror agenda – whether his editor likes it or not.

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It 2 review: You'll float to a convoluted but satisfying end

The Stephen King sequel is overloaded with characters and repetitive scares, but this lovable red balloon keeps floating.

Best New Journalist 2019 Australian IT Journalism Awards

It's back.

We always knew we'd see Pennywise again. The 2017 horror hit It set up the return of the demonic, puerile and at times absurdly funny clown. And after splitting Stephen King's lengthy novel down the middle, It Chapter 2 focuses on the adult versions of the Losers Club reviving the terror they faced as children.

While It Chapter 2 brings their story to a conclusive and largely satisfying end, it disappointingly walks right into the same trap as many sequels. Bloated with story ideas, characters and, most noticeably, running time -- not to mention excessive CGI -- Chapter 2 is at times harder to hang on to than an escaping balloon.

From left, Bill Hader, Jessica Chastain, James McAvoy and James Ransone play the adult Losers.

Starting where we left off, Chapter 2, in theaters now, opens with young Bev ( Sophia Lillis ) and the mini-Losers in 1988. Bev has a vision of the gang facing Pennywise as grown-ups, which comes true 27 years later as the group must fulfill its pledge to kill the demonic clown once and for all.

Reuniting the now adult Losers proves difficult, all but one having moved away from the tormented town of Derry, Maine. The bespectacled Richie ( Bill Hader ) now puts his big mouth to use as a successful standup comedian; the now stutter-free Bill ( James McAvoy ) is a writer who can't seem to deliver good endings; the grown-up Ben ( Jay Ryan ), who is still quietly in love with Bev, is the least recognizable having hit the gym; and the kind and thoughtful Bev ( Jessica Chastain ) is, perhaps surprisingly if you haven't read King's novel, a fashion designer.

James Ransone is instantly recognizable as Eddie, now a risk assessor, capturing the same intense, tightly-wound energy as the young hypochondriac played by Jack Grazer . Ransone's dynamic with a scene-stealing Hader, mainly involving Richie riling Eddie up, recreates the lovable chemistry so wonderfully developed by Chapter 1's young cast.

Hader steals the show.

The hard-working orphan Mike ( Isaiah Mustafa ) is the one who holes up in Derry alone and calls the others to arms. Meanwhile, readers of King's novel will anticipate how Stan ( Andy Bean ), the quietest Loser who was studying for his bar mitzvah in Chapter 1, reacts to the news of Pennywise's return.

After some convincing, the Losers revisit familiar locations in Derry both in the present and through flashbacks: Bev's bathroom, the infamous drain into which Bill's little brother Georgie disappeared, and the abandoned house where the Losers first battled Pennywise. Fantastic young returning cast members, including Lillis and Finn Wolfhard of Stranger Things, once again bring the impeccably scripted banter to life.

As in Chapter 1, the Losers individually face Pennywise ( Bill Skarsgård ), each dealing with a literal demon from their past. Playing with the power of memory, Chapter 2 takes new tunnels through those individual moments, delving further into what once caused the Losers profound despair.

Bill's regret and guilt for letting Georgie play in a storm alone manifests in an emotional standoff. Bev's relationship with her physically and sexually abusive father twists into even darker territory as we discover more about her mother. Sadly, adult Bev still suffers from an abusive relationship -- the young Bev's sparkle all but faded in the jealous marriage that entraps her.

More Chapter 2

Stephen King gave It Chapter 2 star a new take on life ... and death
It Chapter 2: Trailers, cast and everything else you need to know

In the tangle of individual threads, Mike comes off as overly nutty, having spent nearly three decades obsessed with researching Derry's history for clues on how to defeat Pennywise. His findings draw the Losers on a long journey that delves into strange and undeveloped areas involving Pennywise's origins.

Fortunately those thin reveals don't take away from Skarsgård's iconic clown villain, on a par with Heath Ledger's acclaimed transformation into the malevolent Joker in The Dark Knight . Pennywise's piranha-like movements, derpy eyes and drool-sodden mouth form a frightening language that effortlessly translates to other humanoid and monstrous incarnations.

Chapter 2 also sees the return of Bowers ( Teach Grant ), who escapes a psychiatric ward (and swiftly tears his sleeves off). However, the adult Bowers' threat fizzles, now a less-layered psycho compared with the tormented young bully of the earlier film.

Director Andy Muschietti and the film's writers clearly have a lot of ideas, bringing new, bigger forms of monstrosity and crafting multiple doorways into the past. (You should consider rewatching Chapter 1 before seeing the sequel.) But the result could have done with a Pennywise-sized bite torn out. The grown-up Losers retread old ground, face repetitive jump scares and relearn unapologetically saccharine values of love, friendship and bravery.

While It Chapter 2's childhood sentiments come off less believably through an adult lens, the sequel recaptures the lovable heart and humor of its dark predecessor. A brilliant Hader is largely to thank, keeping this big, bulging beast afloat.

2019 movies to geek out over

Originally published Sept. 3.

It Chapter Two (2019)

User Reviews
The film starts off great. Somehow the scene at the bridge manages to match the iconic opening scene of the first.
Skarsgård is an amazing Pennywise and is creepy as hell.
Stan's speech in Richie's second flashback is great and actually funny.
Casting is, for the most part, really good. I think it was hard for some of the adult actors to find a balance between being recognizable while still showing how they've matured over time. Adult Richie is too kid-like while Bev is too mature to the point of being unrecognizable.
Bowers is half-assed. Literally just used for three jump scares and nothing else. Either imply that he died and leave him out or fully use him like he is in the book as the epitome of the corruption in Derry.
The final form of Pennywise is unsatisfying. It's literally a clown torso on some sort of arachnid body. They needed to go full arachnid alien like it is in the book. I think this part is just difficult to translate from the book though.
Stan's letter at the end cheapens his death. Instead of him literally being unable to handle his fear of IT, his suicide is portrayed as a sacrifice to save the others.
There's next to no character development and very little meaningful interaction between characters. I blame this mostly on the middle 90 minutes where they all split up. It's totally different from the first film where they are actually a team.
Speaking of which, this part where they all go their separate ways to find their "tokens" is so contrived. The story literally loses all its steam due to this and makes it feel way too long.
All of the monster scenes except the ones with Pennywise have terrible CGI. They might be gross and/or startling but you can see them coming and they don't contribute much.
About 1/3 to 1/2 of the jokes just kinda fell flat.
The constant jump scenes and long running time just make this movie exhausting to watch. It was just a constant cycle of "pan to character, give a little backstory, jump scare, repeat".
The casting director very much shines in the spotlight here. If there is a category for Best Casting Director in the Academy Award, I am all in to bet that It: Chapter Two's will not just get nominated, but win very big. The casting director deserves a standing ovation for choosing the right actors for the right characters that resemble a lot with the younger-selves from the predecessor.
You will feel the emotional impact of The Losers' Club as a whole. The fear that feeds their souls, the memories that hunt them & the hopeless feeling that manipulates their strength all leave a strong impression to wonder within & about.
The various & disparate forms of IT should give a blast of excitement to the audience. This is the most entertaining part of the movie where you get to watch new other-worldly creatures lingering within the shadows or the old monsters are back to haunt them with a peek-a-boo! It is gross, weird and definitely strange.
The heartwarming story of The Losers' Club friendship is the beautiful gem you will find in no other horror movies this year. The connection they have is so strong and palpable,
An excellent set of transition techniques that jump from one place to another, giving that ominous vibe and at the same time feels like an adventure.
Albeit the creatures are entertaining to watch, however it lacks the manifestation of the scary rituals that should follow. This is the main problem with the IT movies, it is not terrifying nor scary enough to make you have a nightmare. Even sometimes it is laughable due to its unprecedented nature of the creatures' features.
The real form of IT is upsetting and disappointing. I can strongly say that the majority will love IT's true form from the 1990 Television Mini-Series in comparison to the remake because that looks scarier, deadlier & more realistic.
It is super slow and draggy that it doesn't need to be at almost 3 hours mark. 2 hours should be the best run time for this movie like IT Chapter One. It has nothing much to talk about especially during the first hour. Reunion, get together, a few jumpscare parts. That's all there is to it.
The second act of the movie (halfway) feels as if you are watching 5 to 6 different short films instead. Because it has that slow-burning nature, the scenes feel disjointed from one another. It spends around 45 minutes to an hour to look at every members of The Losers' Club being haunted by Pennywise.

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It Chapter Two Review: A Satisfying Finale

Three Ups & Three Downs in IT Chapter Two

This long-anticipated sequel to 2017’s IT takes what remains of Stephen King’s magnum opus and does an admirable job of bringing it to a massive, darker, emotional close.

I vividly remember sitting in an opening day screening of Andy Muschietti’s IT on a beautiful fall day, two years ago. The climax had hit, the Losers Club had made their pact to return to Derry to kill Pennywise should he ever return, and the camera retreats into the sewers of the Barrens, and the title floats above the water. It’s then that the subtitle – Chapter One – appears. And someone down in front shouted, “Oh sh-t! There’s gonna be a Chapter Two!” His wife then began to – loudly – explain that Stephen King’s novel is about a thousand pages long and that so much had been left out, so of course, there had to be an It Chapter Two . And finally, it’s here.

The first film paints a horrific portrait of life in Derry, Maine. On the surface, Derry is an idyllic town, but something dark lurks beneath it, slithering through the sewers, plucking and mauling children at will. It’s an evil that causes the town to not even recognize their own cancerous apathy, their own fears, and it’s rotting Derry from beneath. That’s where the Loser’s Club comes in.

The Losers Club is a group of seven kids who can somehow see through It’s glamour that overshadows the town for what it is: an evil, dancing clown named Pennywise (Bill Skarsgård). In 1988, after investigating a series of gruesome killings, the Losers beat Pennywise, though he’s not truly dead. Twenty-seven years later, he’s returned to kill again. So, with a call from Mike Hanlon, the Losers return to Derry to take up arms against Pennywise.

That’s all the recap I’ll give here – this is a movie to see without any spoilers. It’s also a movie whose book you should read (or reread, as was my job this summer). Stephen King, who’s known for his lengthy tomes, wrote this doorstopper of a novel, and it’s a masterpiece about growing up, love, fear, tragedy, recovery, friendship, and memory. It’s a must-read for everyone, but especially horror lovers.

IT: Chapter Two picks up nearly three decades after its predecessor, and does an effective job of both bringing us up to speed on who our beloved Losers have become and laying out their job: to “kill this f—ing clown.” James McAvoy plays adult Bill, Jessica Chastain plays Beverly, Bill Hader plays Richie, Isaiah Mustafa plays Mike, Jay Ryan plays Ben, James Ransone plays Eddie, and Andy Bean plays Stan – all pitch-perfect counterparts to their teen characters. But let’s be honest, Chastain, McAvoy, and Hader are really noticeably on an entirely different acting level than the rest. I really do applaud the filmmakers’ ability to help us latch onto the adult versions of the characters we met and loved in IT . Quickly, they set up the players, establishing an easy rapport between these estranged friends. And quickly we’re brought into the peril awaiting them in Derry.

This is a darker film than IT , though I don’t see it as truly scarier. Stephen King has long been stronger at portraying our own inner demons as more frightening than anything external–and Pennywise feeds on those inner demons while also externalizing those frights. Muschietti has deftly captured King’s ability here. There are certainly a few moments where I squinted at the screen, knowing a jump scare was just around the corner, but overall it’s much more of an emotionally intense film than a viscerally disturbing watch. At its core, this is about the bond between friends that battles the will of something that wants to isolate and destroy. This story rings relevant and true and works well.

On the other hand, Muschietti and writer Gary Dauberman did try to put their own stamp on King’s story. Many of the changes worked well; some cuts streamlined extraneous or drawn-out subplots, while other minor subplots were added, making the film a tad unwieldy at times. Truly, just about anything not Stephen King stuck out like a sore thumb. It also suffers from Muschietti not filming both Chapters back-to-back. Some of the changes might have worked had we flowed more smoothly from Chapter One to Chapter Two . Also, the kids are noticeably older (and taller), though Muschietti tries to hide that fact–largely through ADR and what seems to be de-aging of the young Losers (have we ever de-aged teenagers before)? It leads to an unsettling uncanny valley that put me off and distracted me quite often.

All that being said, this is an emotionally satisfying end to this duology. There are things I was surprised they added, while other things I thought should have been left behind. IT: Chapter Two brings the saga of The Losers Club and their battle against Pennywise the Clown to a long, emotional close. It’s fun, scary (to a point), but focused less on the scares than on the bonds between friends.

Article by Tyler Howat

Tyler Howat joined Ready Steady Cut in November 2017, publishing over 100 articles for the website. Based out of Wenatchee City, Washington, Tyler has used his education and experience to become a highly skilled writer, critic, librarian, and teacher. He has a passion for Film, TV, and Books and a huge soft spot for Star Trek.

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Review: Thought-provoking 'It: Chapter 2' grows up with its horror heroes

Audiences may still be shaken by the sheer terror that haunted the young teens of the 2017 Stephen King adaptation “It,” but most of the grown-up main characters in the sequel have forgotten. Unfortunately for them, it doesn’t stay that way.

“It: Chapter Two” (★★★ out of four; rated R; in theaters Friday nationwide) packs enough monsters and scares in its 2 hours and 45 minutes to satiate gore hounds . It’s also an ambitious, thought-provoking work that aims for more: While not as tight or affecting as the original tale, in which the Losers’ Club first faced the evil Pennywise ( Bill Skarsgard ), “Chapter Two” tackles themes of memory and childhood trauma, exploring its characters' crippling loss of innocence decades after smacking down a dancing clown.

Last time we saw the young Losers – stuttering leader Bill (Jaeden Martell), wisecracking Richie (Finn Wolfhard), hypochondriac Eddie (Jack Dylan Grazer), rebellious Beverly (Sophia Lillis), history buff Mike (Chosen Jacobs), intellectual Stanley (Wyatt Oleff) and gentle-hearted new kid Ben (Jeremy Ray Taylor) – they defeated child-murdering Pennywise and took a blood oath to return to Derry, Maine, if he ever came back.

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It’s the sequel, so you know he does. But 27 years later, our heroes have moved away and onto successful careers that reflect their younger personalities: Bill (James McAvoy) is a successful horror writer, Stan (Andy Bean) an accountant, Richie ( Bill Hader ) a popular stand-up comedian. Only Mike (Isaiah Mustafa) stayed in town, which is why he alone remembers everything that happened when they were kids.

When residents start going missing in Derry and creepy messages like “Come home” appear, Mike rings up the Losers. Their reunion at a Chinese restaurant is one of the movie's best scenes, as they fall back quickly into old friendships. Some things have changed: Formerly cherubic Ben (Jay Ryan) is now ripped and looks very different to his childhood crush, Bev ( Jessica Chastain ), and there’s a really neat moment where his adoration meets her own gradual recognition.

That meet-up ends in frightening fashion – there’s something seriously wrong with the fortune cookies – and foists a quest upon the group in which they discover the origins of the dark force cursing Derry. Each has to do his or her part leading up to a final face-off with Pennywise.

Director Andy Muschietti deploys Pennywise sparingly; it's a smart decision, because it makes the villain's appearances special, and Skarsgard finds new ways to totally freak you out, even in a surprisingly human fashion. Other monsters stalk the characters, including an old lady Bev visits who transforms into something truly gnarly. But there’s also a brutal streak to the film, from a hate crime early on to instances of domestic abuse.

Needed levity arrives courtesy of Hader, a crucial scene stealer whose Richie always has one foot on the gas pedal out of town but lends gut-wrenching emotion, too. Chastain and James Ransone (as adult Eddie) uncannily match their younger counterparts in look and persona. And Mustafa, best known as the Old Spice guy from commercials, has an impressive breakout with plenty of gravitas – his Mike is the most tortured yet also the most hopeful of the Losers.

However solid the grown-ups are, the youngsters together – whether in the first film or the sequel – make “It” shine. But no matter what age the Losers, Muschietti inherently understands and captures what King does on the page: Even amid nonstop horrors – spider-legged severed heads, a demonic giant Paul Bunyan or that rascally Pennywise – the power of faith and friendship is what matters most.

‘It: Chapter 2’ Is Pennywise But Pace Foolish

By Peter Travers

Peter Travers

Is it weird to say that It: Chapter Two is almost as scary but not quite as grabby as Chapter One? Sorry, the truth hurts. The sequel to the 2017 horror smash faithfully follows Stephen King ’s epic, 1,100-page, 1986 bestseller by skipping ahead 27 years and tracking its protagonist kids into their messy, angst-ridden adulthood. Once called the Losers Club, these children of Derry, Maine, are having a reunion. Not by choice — by force. As young’uns, they vowed only to come home if Pennywise, the twisted and murderous clown who wreaked havoc in Derry back in the day, returned for another killing spree. Well, he’s back. And so is Bill Skarsgård, irreplaceable as the clown prince of infamy. Just the sight of him freezes the blood, flashing those yellow teeth and beckoning prey with that squeaky voice, making false promises that’ll end with him biting their arm off, or worse. Pennywise is only one manifestation of the shape-shifting It, but he’s surely the most horrifying, able to plant seeds of unrest in the subconscious for many sleepless nights to come.

‘It: Chapter Two’: In Praise of Stephen King’s Scariest Creation Ever, Pennywise

You’re hooked, right? And you’ll be pleased to know that the whole cast come up aces. Bill Hader takes Best in Show as Richie “Trashmouth” Tozier, the kid with glasses who is now an acid-tongued L.A. comic. Hader nails the laughs, of course, but his triumph comes in finding the well of loneliness that fuels Richie’s fear, not just of It but of the secret he keeps buried. James McAvoy also scores as Bill Denbrough, Richie’s childhood bestie who married a movie star (Jess Weixler) and is famous for writing books and screenplays with endings everyone hates (hold that thought; it might apply to this movie). Jay Ryan excels as Ben Hanscom, once bullied for being overweight but currently an architect who looks hotter than “a team of Brazilian soccer players,” a fact that does not go unnoticed by Beverly Marsh (Jessica Chastain), the only female in the Losers Club and once a source of romantic rivalry between Ben and Bill. Chastain brings genuine grit and grace to the role of a fashion designer once abused by her father and currently by her husband. Maybe facing It will enable her to make some essential life changes.

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It’s Mike Hanlon (Isaiah Mustafa), the only African American in the gang and the only one of the Losers still living in Derry, who issues the distress call that brings home the old team, including Stanley Uris (Andy Bean), an accountant who’s not as nerdy as he looks, and Eddie Kaspbrak (James Ransone), a risk-averse hypochondriac till the end. It’s these seven who must search out and destroy It, an entity with the power to manifest the individual terror that haunts each of us. And they can only do it together. In these troubled times, that’s meant as uplift.

So what’s the problem? For starters, It: Chapter Two is an ass-numbing two hours and 50 minutes. That’s a good half-hour longer than Chapter One, proving the adage that less is definitely more. The dragging pace diminishes the film’s ability to hold us in its grip. There are endless flashbacks to the characters as kids, as if director Andy Muschietti and screenwriter Gary Dauberman didn’t trust the audience to have seen the first film and decided to squeeze the highlights into this one just in case.

Not among the miscalculations is the decision to include the hate crime that was wrongly eliminated in the 1990 miniseries production of King’s novel. In fact, Muschietti begins his film with the murder of Adrian Mellon, a gay man played by renegade queer Canadian filmmaker Xavier Dolan ( I Killed My Mother ). Based on the real-life 1984 drowning of Charlie Howard, a young gay man viciously attacked in Bangor, Maine, the sequence shows teens gay-bashing Adrian and then throwing him off a bridge into a canal. It’s then that Pennywise reappears, ready to finish the job. King was writing about the roots of evil in human behavior — sadly, a theme that hasn’t grown less timely or relevant. At its best dealing with the horrors of everyday life and our mutual responsibility to end them, It: Chapter Two challenges us to see the worst in ourselves. Now that is truly terrifying.

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Clowns are creepy no matter what. We can all agree on that, right?

But Pennywise, the dancing clown who tracks down and torments the children of small-town Maine in “It,” is deeply unsettling. At least, he is in the latest incarnation of Stephen King ’s iconic novel. Infamously, Tim Curry ’s take on the character in the 1990 TV miniseries version was so over-the-top, it was laughable—not that you’re looking for understatement in your homicidal clowns.

But what Bill Skarsgard does with the role works well precisely because he doesn’t appear to be laboring so hard to frighten us. He doesn’t vamp it up. He’s coy—he toys with these kids—making his sudden bursts of insane clown hostility that much more shocking.

Even more effective than the horror elements of Argentine director Andy Muschietti ’s adaptation is the unexpected humor he reveals in the story—and, ultimately, the humanity. Finding that combination of tones is such a tricky balance to pull off: the brief lightening of a tense moment with a quick quip, or an earnest monologue in the face of extreme danger. But “It” makes that work nearly every time, thanks to its perfectly calibrated performances from a well-chosen cast.

The kid-bonding parts of the movie are actually stronger than the creepy-clown parts, even though images of that freakish, frilly fiend will be the ones that keep you awake at night. Led by “ Midnight Special ” star Jaeden Lieberher —whose everyman (everykid?) appeal grows with each film—and including a star-making performance from Sophia Lillis as the crew’s lone female member, it’s mostly unknown actors who comprise the film’s so-called “Losers Club.” But their characters are distinctly drawn, each with a fleshed-out backstory that explains why their fears make them so vulnerable to Pennywise’s attacks.

Unlike King’s novel and the 1990 original “It,” the screenplay from Chase Palmer , Cary Fukunaga (the acclaimed writer-director of “ Sin Nombre ” and “ Beasts of No Nation ”) and Gary Dauberman doesn’t jump back and forth in time. It moves the time frame to 1988-89 and sticks with our core group of seven kids while they’re still adolescent misfits, which grounds their story and makes it more immersive. (It also surely will draw comparisons to the Netflix series “Stranger Things,” another supernatural mystery set in small-town America in the 1980s. The nostalgia factor is strong for those of us who grew up then, too.)

Muschietti’s version begins as the book does, though, with innocent, six-year-old Georgie Denbrough ( Jackson Robert Scott ) chasing his toy boat as it sails down a gutter and into a storm drain on a rainy afternoon in fictional Derry, Maine. He’s especially fond of the boat because it was a gift from his beloved older brother, Lieberher’s Bill, a smart, skinny kid who struggles with a stutter. That’s why his choice to chat with Pennywise—who just happens to pop up in the sewer with the boat and a smile—leads to his tragic demise. (Muschietti’s cutaways to a cat who witnesses everything from a nearby porch are chilling; he showed that same delicate mastery of mood with his underappreciated 2013 horror film “ Mama ,” starring Jessica Chastain .)

But Bill insists Georgie has just gone missing, as such an unusually large number of Derry children have over the years. He enlists his posse of similarly bullied, outcast pals to help him get to the bottom of this lingering mystery: wisecracking trash-talker Richie ( Finn Wolfhard , who also happens to be in “Stranger Things”); wimpy mama’s boy Eddie ( Jack Dylan Grazer ); nervous rabbi’s son Stanley ( Wyatt Oleff ); heavyset new kid Ben ( Jeremy Ray Taylor ); and the tough-but-kind Beverly (Lillis). Eventually, the home-schooled farmhand Mike ( Chosen Jacobs ), who’s suffered racial attacks as the only black kid in town, makes them a team of seven.

Despite the many terrifying moments they endure in their quest—scenes that will leave you trembling and giggling at once—“It” is even more powerful in the warm, easy camaraderie between its young stars. Certainly you could view it as a straight-up horror flick, but the underlying allegory of these characters facing their deepest fears as they enter adulthood gives the movie more emotional heft—a bit of bittersweet within the suffering.

These kids have all languished on the fringes—hence the “Losers Club” tag they wear as a badge of honor—whether it’s because of an overbearing mother, an abusive father or a devastating family loss. But they’re also all on the cusp of something. Pennywise knows what frightens them in this precarious state of flux and tries to use that devious, supernatural ability to lead kids to their doom. Confronting those fears rather than running away is what just might save them.

Tonally, “It” feels like a throwback to great King adaptations of yore—particularly “Stand By Me,” with its ragtag band of kids on a morbid adventure, affecting bravado and affectionately hassling each other to mask their true jitters. Wolfhard in particular has great comic timing as the profane Richie. Technically, Muschietti shows some glimmers of early Spielberg, too—the low camera angles, the images of kids on bikes pedaling furiously in a pack, the overall mix of wonder and danger.

“It” could have used a bit of tightening as it builds toward its climax, though. While the imagery is undeniably harrowing and even poignant in the action-packed third act, some of it feels dragged out and redundant. And because the final confrontation takes place within a dark, underground lair, it’s sometimes difficult to tell exactly what’s going on, despite the impressive visual effects on display as Pennywise unleashes his full powers on his young attackers. (That’s one of many ways in which the new “It” is a vast improvement over its low-tech predecessor.)

Not to burst your balloon, though, but the closing credits suggest this may not be the last we’ve seen of Pennywise after all.

Christy Lemire

Christy Lemire is a longtime film critic who has written for RogerEbert.com since 2013. Before that, she was the film critic for The Associated Press for nearly 15 years and co-hosted the public television series “Ebert Presents At the Movies” opposite Ignatiy Vishnevetsky, with Roger Ebert serving as managing editor. Read her answers to our Movie Love Questionnaire here .

Chosen Jacobs as Mike Hanlon
Javier Botet as The Leper
Owen Teague as Patrick Hockstetter
Jaeden Lieberher as Bill Denbrough
Jackson Robert Scott as Georgie
Steven Williams as Leroy Hanlon
Bill Skarsgård as Pennywise
Jack Dylan Grazer as Eddie Kaspbrak
Logan Thompson as Victor Criss
Jake Sim as Belch Huggins
Sophia Lillis as Beverly Marsh
Jeremy Ray Taylor as Ben Hanscom
Finn Wolfhard as Richie Tozier
Wyatt Oleff as Stan Uris
Nicholas Hamilton as Henry Bowers
Andy Muschietti
Benjamin Wallfisch
Cary Fukunaga
Chase Palmer
Gary Dauberman

Cinematographer

Chung-hoon Chung
Jason Ballantine

Writer (based on the novel by)

Stephen King

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It Chapter Two is down to clown, again — in a bloody, silly, overwrought sequel

More than once in It: Chapter Two , someone onscreen mutters “you gotta be f—in’ kidding me.” It’s hard, from the cheap seats, not to start to agree; the film spends so much of its two-hour-and-45-minute runtime shoving scares down the audience’s collective throat that they eventually crossed over to the other side (at least at this particular New York screening) and start giggling at the sheer bogey-man lunacy of it all.

To be fair, Chapter Two is mostly more (and more) of the same that made 2017’s It one of the highest-grossing horror films of all time : There be mad clowns, and bad drains, and gushing, Costco-size buckets of blood. Except the scrappy kids of the Losers’ Club have now grown past the Stranger Things follies of their ‘80s youth and become grown adults.

Or more accurately, grown movie stars: James McAvoy is Bill, a novelist and screenwriter still mourning the violent long-ago death of his little brother, Georgie; Jessica Chastain ‘s Beverly remains the sensitive redhead with supernatural visions, only now she’s married to a rich creep who casually beats her; Jay Ryan’s Ben has shed his baby fat and become a sleek real-estate mogul; Bill Hader ’s Richie has successfully graduated to stand-up comedy, and James Ransone’s nervous Eddie now does risk assessment, fittingly, for an insurance company.

Andy Bean’s nebbishy Stanley doesn’t get much new backstory, but he seems to be in a nice, stable marriage. Only Mike (Isaiah Mustafah) has chosen to remain in tiny Derry, Maine — a picturesque village that just happens to sit over some kind of cursed carnival hellmouth.

After an ugly incident there, it’s Mike who calls the gang back together to honor their long-ago blood oath, the one that pledged to finish the job if Pennywise (Bill Skarsgaard) ever returned to wreak his red-nose havoc again. It helps to have read Stephen King’s doorstop novel , or at least have seen the previous film, if you have any passing interest in the mythology of how and why Pennywise does what he do — which here, apparently, is mostly eat children by the handful like Skittles, and work chortling insult-comic material into his escaped preys’ nightmares.

Otherwise, you’ll have to trust Argentinian director Andy Muschietti to methodically woodchuck his way through 1,100-plus pages of terror, and toss nearly every horror trope into the maw as he does so. It’s as if the film can’t trust that something is scarier when it’s implied than when it’s constantly, literally personified by demonic old ladies, skittering man-faced spiders, and murderous, reanimated Paul Bunyans. They’re under the bed, in the basement, inside fortune cookies and bathroom stalls and, but of course, a nefarious, disorienting hall of mirrors .

Hader and Ransone do a lot to mitigate the long slog from one relentlessly ghoulish set piece to the next; their dry, side-mouthed humor brings much-needed levity in a movie that seems determined to reduce accomplished actors like McAvoy and Chastain to so much panicky meat-snack for Pennywise.

Some of Muschietti’s other filmmaking choices feel problematic too: the brutal gay-bashing incident that opens the movie (and to be fair, comes directly from the book ) seems to signal nothing, really, other than that it’s safer to tolerate a nasty bully than confront them; and the lone black character, Mustafah’s Mike, is also the only one who seems to have no discernible personality, other than Guy Who Stayed in Derry.

But really, the main problem with Chapter Two is that it goes on, and on, for so very long. If brevity is not necessarily the soul of a good scare, it would certainly serve a story that sends in the clowns, and then lets them just stay there — leering and lurking and chewing through scene after scene — until the there’s nothing left to do but laugh, or leave. C+

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It: Chapter 2 review thread.

Rotten tomatoes : 79% (78 reviews).

Critics Consensus:- It: Chapter Two proves bigger doesn't always mean scarier for horror sequels, but a fine cast and faithful approach to the source material keep this follow-up afloat.

[Metacritic] ( https://www.metacritic.com/movie/it-chapter-two ): 60 (27 Reviews)

——————————————————————

When it comes down to it, It Chapter Two just isn't all that scary.

Really, the main problem with Chapter Two is that it goes on, and on, for so very long.

Entertainment Weekly

It Chapter Two isn't better than Chapter One. It's certainly not scarier. Here's the thing, though: when it counts, it's every bit as thrilling.

London Evening Standard

It is just so pointlessly long: approaching three hours, with our heroes finally beginning to assume a glassy-eyed solemnity like Hogwarts graduates or the Fellowship of the Ring.

IT Chapter Two isn't as refined as the first, but it's still an excellent ensemble piece, oozing with heart and packed with extremely well-crafted set pieces. Muschietti weaves the young and adult Losers together well, giving the sequel an epic feel.

Although marred by pacing issues and some shoddy CGI, It Chapter Two still has enough creepy set-pieces and solid performances to bring the saga to an effective, albeit formulaic, con.

An elaborate fun-house horror movie that springs pop-up gimmicks and boogie-boogie scares steadily enough to excuse its been-there story and self-important 169-minute running time.

It is glorious to see this stuff envisioned on such a huge and self-assured scale, a joy to have a film of this size trading in this sort of genre carnage with such uncompromising and unapologetic style.

Empire Online

Andy Muschietti did a great job of not only staying faithful to the source material, but also adding fresh spins and ideas to this adaptation of a Stephen King classic. If you're a fan of the first movie (like me), you'll love this sequel.

Geeks of Color

For all of Muschietti’s visual flourishes and with the greatly talented Bill Skarsgard again delivering a madcap, disturbingly effective, all-in performance as the dreaded Pennywise, It: Chapter Two had a relatively muted impact on me.

Chicago Sun-Times

It Chapter Two is about redemption and the Losers coming together again to learn how strong they all are together. And the actors make it work. But the biggest problem is IT, because IT can be everything and IT can be nothing. IT has no real rules or motivations, or rhyme or reason, for literally anything he does.

Hader rises above the rest. If you've seen "Barry," his HBO series, you know he has no problem blending comedy and drama. In this case, he adds horror to the mix, and he's just as good at that, too.

Arizona Republic

Andy Muschietti

Gary Dauberman

James McAvoy

Jessica Chastain

Isaiah Mustafa

James Ransone

Bill Skarsgård

Benjamin Wallfisch

Cinematography

Checco Varese

$60–70 million

As with other movies, the scores are set to change as time passes.

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'My First Film' Review: Zia Anger’s Daring “Directorial Debut” Is the Meta Movie to End All Meta Movies

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What is it to make a movie ? Often, we think of singular auteurs almost effortlessly spinning visions of astounding beauty from nothing but their imagination for us to reverentially take in while immersed in the darkness of a cinema. However, even for those who spend hours reading about the creative process and hungrily consuming the details of a production, rarely can we truly get an honest look into a film’s creation. Is there not the devastating potential that you could spend years and years of your life toiling away only to discover what you made may serve more as a monument to the pain you felt while creating it than it was to any sort of artistic achievement? What would you then do with this complicated legacy? If you’re filmmaker Zia Anger , you make My First Film , a fantastic “feature debut” that is grappling with an unreleased prior film and an extension of her solo performance which is now also one of the most surprising, layered films of the year. It’s the meta movie to end all meta movies .

The first time I became familiar with Anger was at the Tacoma Film Festival in 2019, when she was touring said solo performance that she also called My First Film. With a laptop in hand that she projected on the screen, the multimedia experience involved her, among many things, sharing clips of the first feature she had made, Always All Ways, Anne Marie , and offering reflections in typed messages about the process now that it had been lost to time after never getting distribution. It was deeply honest, often quite painful, and ultimately poetic in ways that have stuck with me ever since. This performance is radically different from the film My First Film , now getting a release five years later through MUBI , as I soon realized while watching it. At the same time, the reason this context is important is that the two remain in conversation with each other as this film expands on her history by creating a movie that restages the first production she ever made while also bringing with it a similar framing. It takes us deeper into her film and its legacy, holding up her own past to the light so we can see all of her insecurities bursting free. At the same time, her feature is given new life as it becomes a quiet triumph when remolded and revisited all these many years later.

What Is 'My First Film' About?

The film begins similarly to how Anger’s solo performance did with text and clips , recounting one particularly frustrating interview that serves as a launching point into her past. This further soon shifts to being more built around narration as opposed to the reading of written words, though we do occasionally see text being typed on screen. The one doing the typing this time appears to be Vita, played by an outstanding Odessa Young of films like The Damned , Manodrome , and Shirley , who is reflecting on her first feature 15 years prior.

She is the Zia of this story, navigating the stressful process of making a film with a group of her friends and one particularly annoying boyfriend. There is a charming abandon to how this is all shot with the group gathering and sharing in the giddy excitement of creating something together, capped off by a scene of a plane flying by at a perilously low level that gets waved away. This potential danger is a sign of how little any of the group, Vita included, know what they’re doing. They’re winging it and with that comes the sense that this film may not be what anyone hoped it would be. This is something that gets spoken aloud by Vita in a key moment, proving to be part of the multitude of ways the film is a work of daring self-portraiture that isn’t afraid to engage with the past personal mistakes being made .

As we see, this film is by no means the creation of just one person and, in many ways, its crumbling comes because that wasn’t appreciated. Though Vita is its director, the story expands to see more of the crew in a way that Anger’s solo show didn’t, finding more unexpected character beats just as it explores similar thematic ground. My First Film is increasingly focused on where a director may have not been as considerate of the needs of her crew as she should have , with one central moment playing back several times over in slightly different ways capturing a feeling of pain and regret in striking fashion. This is no romanticized look back at a past film, but a deeply honest one. In every frame, both within the production of the film and outside of it, it feels like we're witnessing something profoundly personal that may soon slip through our fingers. It's worth cherishing every moment of.

'My First Film' Is a Bold New Beginning for Zia Anger

More than anything, it’s the ways that Anger pulls back the curtain and disrupts the film’s more conventional narrative progression that makes it into something quite special . Comparisons could be made to Joanna Hogg ’s stunning The Souvenir and The Souvenir: Part II as well as Víctor Erice ’s breathtaking Close Your Eyes in how they’re all similarly autobiographical, though that would only get at a small sliver of how My First Film extends into something more. Each is vastly different formally, with Anger letting things get both more slippery and intentionally scattered, as if we’re remembering a distant memory back along with her. Nowhere is this more felt than in the film’s bold, beautiful big swing of a finale.

Without robbing any of what preceded it of its power and sense of mourning, all the layers it pulls back reveal something preciously hopeful. It’s still painful and more than a bit unwieldy in ways it may not have a full handle on, but is that not life as an artist? Anger certainly seems to think so and, as it all gets realized so spectacularly here, her fantastic first film that’s really not the first is one we can only hope serves as a new beginning to many more .

My First Film (2024)

Zia Anger's My First Film is a daring work of art that embraces the unwieldiness of life to find something beautiful from what was lost.

It is a feature that is given new life, becoming a quiet triumph when remolded and revisited.
The experience is one worth cherishing every moment of as every frame brings something profoundly personal that may soon slip through our fingers.
It's a bold new beginning for Zia Anger, proving to be a work that we can only hope won't be the last but the first of something new.

Aspiring filmmaker Vita reflects on her chaotic first attempt at directing a semi-autobiographical film 15 years ago. Her inexperience leads to a spiraling production, marked by significant disruptions and a near-fatal accident. The film explores the blurred lines between fact and fiction, creating a modern myth about the creative process.

My First Film is in theaters in the U.S. starting August 30 and on MUBI starting September 6. Click below for showtimes near you.

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A close-up of Michael Keaton as Beetlejuice in Beetlejuice 2

‘Beetlejuice Beetlejuice’ reviews might prove Michael Keaton’s worrying comment right

After 36 years, Beetlejuice is finally getting a sequel. The original 1988 film is a pop culture staple, meaning Beetlejuice Beetlejuice has big shoes to fill. Michael Keaton’s recent comment was a bit worrying, and early reviews might’ve just proved him right.

Entertainment Weekly’ s video series Around the Table saw Keaton (Beetlejuice), Jenna Ortega (Astrid Deetz), Willem Dafoe (Wolf Jackson), Monica Bellucci (Delores), and Justin Theroux (Rory) get together to discuss the upcoming film. Here, among his Beetlejuice Beetlejuice co-stars, Keaton expressed some hesitancy about doing the sequel:

The only thing I worried about was, should we have left it alone? You know? Should we have just said that: ‘Don’t touch it. Just walk away. Go make your other movies,’ which we did. So, for me, it was a big roll of the dice.” Michael Keaton (Entertainment Weekly)

Hearing the sequel described as a “roll of the dice” is worrying. After all, countless iconic movies have fallen victim to the sequel curse. The Exorcist’s legacy is unmatched, whereas The Exorcist II’s only legacy is being universally panned. Dumb and Dumber was a comedy hit, while Dumb and Dumber To was comically bad.

At this point, questionable sequels are par for the course. While they don’t usually hurt the original’s renown, they can harm the franchise as a whole. Make enough “bad” sequels, and audiences start throwing around words like “greed” and “cash grab.” Need we delve into the complicated discourse around sequel-heavy franchises like Star Wars and Marvel?

In that respect, Keaton’s “roll of the dice” metaphor is understandable. Bringing back an iconic movie with a universe as beloved as the one created by Tim Burton comes with a significant amount of risk. Expectations are at an all-time high, and with Keaton playing the namesake character, a lot of that pressure falls on him. There’s also Burton’s filmography to consider.

Tim Burton isn’t known for sequels

Hailed by many as one of the best directors out there, Burton didn’t earn his reputation because of sequels. In fact, prior to Beetlejuice Beetlejuice , Burton only directed one sequel: Batman Returns , which had a rather rocky reception upon release. Burton’s trademark gothic rebelliousness isn’t just limited to his films. It extends into his attitude toward sequels and franchises. His characters are deeply personal to him, and he doesn’t easily turn them over to big studios just looking to make a buck. If that were the case, we’d already have those highly demanded Edward Scissorhands and Nightmare Before Christmas followups.

The fact that Burton is even doing another Beetlejuice movie proves that he believes in it. As reported by Deadline , the sequel, like most of his projects, is “very personal” for him. He then went on to add, “Over the past few years, I got disillusioned with the movie business. So I knew if I was going to do something, I wanted to do it from my heart.”

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice reviews are a little concerning

For many, 1988’s Beetlejuice is an important film that is equally dark and hopeful. Keaton’s Beetlejuice steals the show, yet the emotional beats are found in the crumbling relationship between an uprooted family and their teenage daughter. Lydia Deetz remains an icon who wants to be misunderstood as much as she craves understanding. And yes, her goth girl realness offers a voice to all the misfits out there who feel like they don’t usually get one.

Those going to see the sequel are undoubtedly looking to recapture those same feelings. They want a nostalgia hit. They want lightening in a bottle. They want to laugh and cry and experience the sequel like it’s the first time. Obviously, that’s no easy feat, and maybe Keaton is right. Maybe they should’ve just left Beetlejuice alone to reign as the spooky little comedy it is. Early reviews suggest there might be some truth there. IGN called Beetlejuice Beetlejuice “charming (if unnecessary),” while Empire dubbed it “fun, if a bit messy.” The Guardian’ s review was particularly brutal, calling the sequel “underpowered and throwaway.”

Like me, you’re probably a little disheartened by these mixed reviews. However, what matters here is expectations. Beetlejuice Beetlejuice won’t be exactly like the original, and that can be okay. Keaton’s “roll of the dice” comment is spot on. When you’re dealing with people’s nostalgia, it can be very hit or miss. So, keep that in mind if you’re planning on checking out Beetlejuice Beetlejuice when it hits theaters on September 6, 2024 .

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‘beetlejuice beetlejuice’ review: winona ryder and michael keaton help tim burton rediscover the ghoulish mischief of his glory days.

Catherine O’Hara, Jenna Ortega and Justin Theroux also star in the Venice opener, a sequel to the 1988 horror comedy about a renegade “bio-exorcist” liberated from the afterlife.

By David Rooney

David Rooney

Chief Film Critic

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Luca guadagnino’s ‘queer,’ starring daniel craig, acquired by a24, tim burton explains why alec baldwin and geena davis aren’t in ‘beetlejuice’ sequel, jenna ortega hits the red carpet for ‘beetlejuice beetlejuice’ premiere in venice, ‘beetlejuice beetlejuice’ slays at venice premiere, lupita nyong’o remembers chadwick boseman four years after his death: “grief never ends”, netflix nabs angelina jolie’s ‘maria’ ahead of venice bow.

To revisit this article, visit My Profile, then View saved stories .

What Is Cinema?

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice Would’ve Been Better Off Dead

The first Beetlejuice film, released in 1988, is ornate and simple all at once. Tim Burton ’s visual world is busy and hectic, a riot of sideways whimsy and cartoonish gore that, along with 1990’s Edward Scissorhands , defined the director’s house style early in his career. But the story contained within all that oddball architecture is not so complex. It’s mostly about two people realizing they’ve died and learning how to be ghosts. It’s a discovery movie, a satisfying explication of the afterlife’s best and worst practices.

Which makes Beetlejuice a tough candidate for sequelization. How do you compellingly teach an audience what it’s already learned and still fondly remembers? Perhaps that’s why it took Burton and crew 35 years to come up with a follow-up. And yet, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice suggests that nearly four decades wasn’t quite long enough.

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice , which premiered here at the Venice Film Festival 2024 on Wednesday, is a rats nest of callbacks and plot, so jumbled and overstuffed it’s almost abstract. It’s yet another legacy sequel that serves as sad testament to the original film’s ingenuity.

When Beetlejuice Beetlejuice isn’t desperately echoing what worked in the original, it is manically introducing new characters and premises. Roughly speaking, the film is about grownup Lydia Deetz ( Winona Ryder ) trying to reconcile with her estranged daughter, Astrid ( Jenna Ortega ). Lydia, a widow, has leveraged her ability to commune with the dead to become the host of a popular ghost-hunting TV series, a job that doesn’t really track with the jaded, sullen loner we met in 1988. But, people change, and so Lydia is now a pushover sellout whose daughter thinks she’s a fraud. It’s a depressing reentry to the franchise, a glum assertion that adulthood will flatten and compromise personality.

Mother and child are pulled this way and that by the many narrative strings of the film—which, depending on the minute, concerns a death in the family, an upcoming wedding, a case of puppy love, and the angry, soul-sucking (quite literally) ex-wife of the titular ghoul. Burton keeps our heads swiveling at breakneck speed, erratically jumping between storylines that never really converge. At one point in the film, Astrid asks her mother what happened to the ghosts Lydia knew as a teenager: the ones played so winsomely by Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis. Lydia hurriedly says that they found a loophole and moved on to the next plane, and Astrid just about turns to the camera to say, “How convenient.”

Image may contain Clothing Coat Jacket Formal Wear Suit Adult Person Blazer Accessories Tie Face and Head

Which indicates that the film is aware that cheap narrative fixes are a pain, but stridently employs them anyway. Problems are solved with snaps of fingers or sudden digressions from interior logic. Monica Bellucci ’s Delores, the murderous one-time wife of Beetlejuice ( Michael Keaton , of course), is supposedly even more wicked than Mr. Juice, and is introduced in the film as an impending storm—what will she do when she finally gets her revenge? Then she stalks around the edges of the movie until Burton abruptly decides he’s done with her. Ditto for Astrid’s romantic interlude, a plot loaded with potential that is hastily sketched out and resolved.

Keaton, for his part, still remembers how to play the title character, though I wish someone had done some punch-up on his asides and one-liners. Ryder is stymied by Lydia’s newfound meekness, while Ortega is stuck playing a less dynamic moody teen than the one she plays on Wednesday (also produced by Burton) . Willem Dafoe barely registers as a dead TV cop who works as a real investigator in the afterlife (or something), while the great Catherine O’Hara , as Lydia’s blithe artist stepmother, Delia, struggles to make anything distinct out of this perfunctory revisit.

With its limp humor, canned sentiment, and over-egged efforts to gross us out, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice is a waste of a good cast and a defacement of a classic film’s legacy. Most galling of all, it was summoned willingly by people who should know better than to mess with what’s long been peacefully laid to rest.

Richard Lawson

Chief critic.

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