Pet Sematery Review

Merisa Taylor, Staff Writer, Page Designer

Spoiler alert! Please do not proceed if you do not wish for the plot of Pet Sematery to be revealed.


 “Pet Sematery” was released in theaters on April 5th this year. It’s based on Stephen King’s bone-chilling novel, which was originally published in 1983. This movie is also a remake of the original movie that was made back in 1989.

  The title of the movie is spelled incorrectly as “sematery” instead of “cemetery” because it was a place made by children and reflects a child’s spelling of the word. This makes for a cute detail for a gruesome tale.

  The movie starts out with the Creed family leaving their Boston home to start a new life in Maine. Dr. Louis Creed, his wife Rachel and their two kids make up the family. When they arrive their daughter sees kids taking their pet to the pet sematery.  She follows these kids and finds the burial grounds of the town’s pets.

  There is a wall of wood surrounding the forest in the town and Jud Crandall, their neighbor warns her not to climb it. When the family cat Church goes missing and is later found dead, Jud tells Louis to follow him over the wood wall to an old ritual place that brings pets that are buried there back to life. Church comes back to life but he isn’t the same sweet kitty he was before.

  On her ninth birthday, Ellie gets hit by a speeding truck and dies. Louis can’t take the pain of losing his daughter and despite Jud’s warnings brings Ellie back to life by burying her in the ritual grounds. She comes back to life as a monster and Jud tries to stop her but ends up dying at the hands of this new Ellie. Louis realizes Ellie is evil after she attacks and kills her mother. Next, she attacks Louis when he tries to stop her. She drags everyone’s bodies (Jud, Rachel, Louis, and her brother) to the ritual grounds and buries them so that they all come back evil like her. The movie ends with the cat appearing again and then the credits roll.

  This movie was not as good as it could have been. The producers changed information from the book and it wasn’t as scary. The movie also could have had more explanation along with more interesting effects.

  In the book and 1989 film the younger brother dies from an accident, not Ellie. According to the producers, it was a strategic move that had to be made in order to make the story fresh.

  The movie is a two on my fear scale. Though it had its terrifying moments it was mostly a dull thriller type movie, or as I like to call it, a beginners horror movie. You can tell that it’s only rated R for its adult humor and language in some scenes. When you think of a horror movie you typically think jumping in your seat scary and there was definitely no seat jumping while watching this movie.

  The film should have had more information regarding the mother, Rachel’s sister and why she was so important. In the film, Rachel refuses to talk much about her except for that she was ill in a sense that she couldn’t move and was bedridden. It would have been really interesting to see more about the sisters and why she was so important.

  I would recommend this movie to anyone who is not too into horror movies but wants to start with a not so scary one. I give this movie a 6 out of 10 and I would rather not see it a second time.