MovieChat Forums > It (2017) Discussion > Is a realistic clown more terrifying tha...

Is a realistic clown more terrifying than this CGI creeper?

posted 7 years ago by [deleted]
20 replies | jump to latest

Someone made a great point, the strength of the original It was that he looked like a regular clown, which is playful and fun and at first you might even think he's innocent and inviting. A lot of pedophiles try to appear innocent and inviting.

This clown? He looks evil. He's the type of clown you don't want to see. But is that missing the point? It lured kids in with his clown face and balloons, very enticing to children.

If that's the essence of this character, then they missed the mark completely.

What do you think? Do people in 2017 want to cut to the chase and see an evil clown instead of realising that his evil is lurking under the surface of his clown face?

[–] AP (5260) 7 years ago

As I understand it, the book version was more likely to change shape for each kid to play on his/her fear and being a clown was just one of many forms it took. I never read the book, so I'm just going off what I've heard.

The people who made the miniseries wanted him to be a clown more often than not (although he changes into a werewolf, Beverley's zombie father, etc. in the miniseries too). The idea was that his clown form was what he used to lure kids in.

This movie played up on the fear-based shape shifting. The clown form seemed to be the default, but he still used this form to scare the kids.

[–] Nolo32 (3) 7 years ago

IT is the essence indeed.Thats why this movie is not scary at all. They missed all the points that made the old one scary as hell....

[–] SamDirtbagBurns (15) 7 years ago

I'm not a fan of CGI and the scenes I enjoyed the most were when Pennywise looked more "normal". However, I have to disagree with people saying that in the book "It" used the clown form to lure kids; the intention was quite the opposite. The clown never looked "right" to anyone. Even Georgie new something was entirely off about the situation he was in. Even picturing himself getting up and running away. "It" had the ability to almost hypnotize its prey. "It" also wanted, almost needed its victim to be frightened. Although, it definitely enjoyed playing with them a bit. That's part of what makes it truely evil!

[–] Stringey (260) 7 years ago

In my opinion in the drain scene at the beginning with the exception of the yellow eyes at first(when George sees again they are blue) penny wise looks and sounds innocent. However despite this innocent appearance and goofiness there is something George senses especially when the clown stops laughing and smile disappears. The drain if i remember blocks off his forehead which makes him look less creepy. And of course penny wise is disguising his voice for George as a happy clown. Notice this is the only time in the movie he does this. With the older kids who can't be fooled by a clown he always uses his monster voice.

[–] nauru-1 (160) 7 years ago

Yes, I wasn't frightened by the Pennywise stuff at all, and that goes double for the effects-driven sequences. Thankfully the movie had some other great things going for it instead.

[–] Barclays (960) 7 years ago

Yeah the clown even looked evil from the very first scene. And what was the deal with those floating children? It looked so silly. It would have been creepier if they showed their rotting corpses lying in a huge pile.

[–] Costumer (1798) 7 years ago

Except it is part of the story that It's victims floats. Its repeated many times. And piles of bodies have been done many times.

[–] Barclays (960) 7 years ago

Yes I understand that it was mentioned by the clown that its victims float but not in the sense of how this movie shows.They float is an idea that bodies float in a sewer since sewers are known to have water in them. IT takes it's victims down into the sewer and kills them. They float or we float is not supposed to be taken in a completely literally sense as if they are suspended up in the air. And there were a bunch of other things the director does that has been used in countless of other horror movies so don't give me that nonsense about originality.

[–] zephyr_cape (2979) 7 years ago

Man the decision to go with a literal interpretation of floating is such a bummer. It completely takes the ominousness out of Pennywise's "you'll/we all float" lines. It becomes just, oh, he really means you'll *magically* float! It's supposed to abstractly insinuate that you're going to fucking die!

The reveal of the deadlights was really cool but the rest of that whole climactic sequence felt 100% like Pirates of the Caribbean or Harry Potter to me.

[–] zephyr_cape (2979) 7 years ago

The WHOLE point of "you'll float" is to take the nice sense of a balloon literally floating and insinuate the dark other sense of floating dead in fucking sewer water. Lol it's really pissing me off now. Gadddd

[–] zephyr_cape (2979) 7 years ago

That literal floating kids bologna is possibly as big a fail as the giant spider in IT 1990. It doesn't bode well for how they'll handle that in Chapter II. I'm scared.

[–] Barclays (960) 7 years ago

The entire movie felt like an episode of Goosebumps.

I thought the reveal of the deadlights was another thing the director got wrong. Although I suppose that that's the only way he could visualize it. The deadlights are mentioned in a few of King's novels. I've always interpreted the deadlights to be a macabre representation of the white light people say they see in their dying moments. So in a sense, that's what the clown was showing Beverly in his gaping maul as he was about to devour her. But then the horror of that moment was killed and turned silly when we later see her only slightly suspended in the air and turning it into a sleeping beauty moment.

Why don't directors consult Stephen King for details on the symbolism or abstract ideas in his novels before the story boards are created? That way they get it right so we won't be disappointed every time a movie or tv series is adapted from the novels or short stories. The Mist tv series is a joke. If I were Stephen King I would be embarrassed. These awful adaptations really make the novels seem silly when in fact the novels are really good. So many of King's written works have scared the crap out of me. I remember feeling terrified while reading Pet Sematary. But the movie adapted from the novel is lame. Ironically the sequel was scarier and not adapted from King at all.

[–] zephyr_cape (2979) 7 years ago

Yeah I agree, I mainly thought the gaping deadlights mouth moment was visually cool, probably the most visually interesting idea in the whole movie, and neat enough that I didn't mind so much that it could have been done in a way that captured the essence of the book better.

Haha what was he thinking indeed, I keep asking myself exactly that.

I felt like the direction needed to become more cinematically abstract to convey those metaphysical encounters with IT. It needed to dissolve into the poetics of pure cinema, more in the direction of the end of 2001: A Space Odyssey or The Shining or something. I would have liked to see images that convey a feeling while not literally trying to *show* us what is "happening". This story lends itself so well to abstraction the same way these ideas worked in the book because of how frayed off into literary abstraction they became. Really the whole novel works as well as it does for me because it seems to come from a place that appreciates the holographic / abstract nature of writing itself.

I can see how someone could arrive at more of a magical adventure movie romp like this ended up being from the source material, and clearly there are a lot of people who like that move. It's one way to respond to the campy nature of the story as it would need to be presented to be taken seriously in 2017. I can't help but have mental images of how this could have been done as a much more abstract and grimly psychological film that I think would have had more of a serious and lasting impact.

[–] Barclays (960) 7 years ago

I agree with you. Not sure that I want to see chapter two having already been disappointed with chapter one though.
I'm looking forward to seeing Happy Death Day. Are you?

[–] zephyr_cape (2979) 7 years ago

Yup I'm not expecting much but I will definitely go see it mainly because I'm curious how they're going to handle parts like the final encounter, the witch, how the adult parts work, etc. I just feel like I need to know.

Woah I haven't heard anything about Happy Death Day, but I'm going to check it out here!!

[–] zephyr_cape (2979) 7 years ago

I know we hear this comment all the time but can you imagine how beautiful this movie could have been with practical effects instead of CGI? I can totally see something super demented in the vein of Evil Dead 2's stop motion and puppet sequences, or Nightmare on Elm or even a few of the visuals in Beetlejuice. They were on the right track with the effects in 1990 I thought! Pennywise coming out of the shower drain? That was so perfectly craggedly nightmarish looking! Even what if the movie had more of an Evil Dead 2-esque dark humor that's still super twisted and unnerving overall, instead of the pastiche of jump scares vs adventure comedy scenes we got for that matter?

When I ask myself if anything was improved upon from IT 1990...
TBH not much! Some of the new decisions were worthy alternatives, but were there improvements?
I've read a good number of people comment that "they didn't have the technology to do it visually convincingly in 1990"... Is the CGI in this one MORE "convincing" than 1990's practicals?
First of all what does "convincing" even mean, and why are we so concerned with things appearing real in movies? In the sense of convincing me that the visuals are *real*, no way is it more convincing. In a sense it's much less convincing because it obviously lacks any physical reality in any sense. Even a stylized or less than realistic effect has more impact because it's actually there. Practical innately lends itself to being more horrifying because while we know it isn't "real" in the sense we're asked to believe, it in fact IS a real thing! And that creates psychological dissonance that's unnerving. A film isn't real and we know that, especially in such a far-fetched one as this, so why not let visual effects decisions be geared towards creating a particular *feeling* rather than "convincing" of realism?

[–] zephyr_cape (2979) 7 years ago

The acting on the part of the non-clown characters was a little bit better than in 1990. But imo it's not worth the diminished character development we got. The kids section of 1990 was I thought just about perfect anyway, and the parts I think most deserve reconsideration came in Pt. II.

[–] Lord Rake (3900) 7 years ago

I agree the kids parts were good even with the overthetop Henry Bowers in the miniseries.

"And the parts I think most deserve reconsideration came in Pt. II."

Wait until the sequel for this comes out. It will be the same exact problem because King's original narrative is mainly focused on the kids encounters with it. The adult parts are really just a rehash of what happened before and characters remembering what they forgot. Basically King gave a perfect blueprint for a horror movie with the main portion of IT. After that, good luck, even in the novel the adult encounters with IT are far less interesting.

[–] [deleted] 7 years ago

Given the sewer aspect, I interpreted 'floating' as a dead body, floating its way through the sewer network. I didn't think they'd literally be floating. I think it meant that their souls were in some sort of limbo, like the movie Ghost Ship.

[–] jasonbourne (1027) 7 years ago

Tim Curry played the original Pennywise and once he got into his clown makeup and demeanor, the other actors were afraid to hang with him. He did a nice piece of acting and getting into his menacing role. I'm not complaining about today's It as the CGI creates a different story for a different time. More fantasy horror as Pennywise makes those around him hallucinate. If there is a weakness to the new version, it's that the supporting cast is there just to be killed. Not much to draw you into those characters. It's escapism more than a realistic horror story.