Pet Sematary

Big-screen adaptation of Stephen King’s dark novel (the best-selling author wrote the screenplay and also made a brief cameo in the film), “Pet Sematary” is a horror movie that’s more significant on the visual front than the conceptual one. In fact, despite a plot basically faithful to its literary source, Lambert’s film has a tough time conveying that same sense of oppression and discomfort one finds in the King of Horror’s book which delves much deeper into the ubiquity of death and the inability to accept the loss of loved ones.

Unfortunately, other than the elderly Jud Crandall (a convincing Fred Gwynne), the characters are definitely on the bland side. The main couple is unbelievably off-putting, while the post-mortem Victor Pascow comes across like a watered-down imitation of Jack Goodman in “An American Werewolf in London” (1981).

At any rate, the film boasts a substantial number of admirers among horror fans. From a purely entertainment standpoint, the end result really isn’t atrocious – beyond a rather pervasive splatter component – the special effects are quite good -, numerous scenes feature the camera happily lingering on the most horrific and disgusting details.