Stephen King Horror-Thon: It (1990)

Director Tommy Lee Wallace (Halloween III: Season of the Witch and Fright Night Part 2) had a challenging road ahead when signed on to direct one Stephen King’s most shocking and unsettling horror novels of his career.

It follows a group of outcast kids (dubbed the Losers Club) in the small town of Derry, Maine circa 1960. In the film’s introductory sequence, stuttering kid Bill crafts a paper sailboat for his little brother Georgie, who takes the boat outside during a rainstorm to play with the paper boat in his neighborhood’s watery roads. When his boat floats into a storm drain, Georgie encounters Pennywise the Dancing Clown who tricks Georgie into reaching into the storm drain for the boat before biting his arm off and leaving him to bleed out on the streets.

Pennywise: Ohhh. Come on, bucko. Don’t you want a… balloon?

Georgie: I’m not supposed to take stuff from strangers. My dad said so.

Pennywise: Very wise of your dad, Georgie. Very wise indeed… I, Georgie, am Pennywise the Dancing Clown! You are Georgie! So, now we know each other! Correct?

Georgie: I guess so… I gotta go.

Pennywise: Go? Without this?

[showing Georgie his fallen paper boat]

Georgie: My boat!

Pennywise: Exactly! Go on, kiddo… Take it.

A few months pass and Bill slowly befriends the group of awkward schoolmates, who all experience their own terrifying, near-death encounters with Pennywise. As a group, the kids research Pennywise and discover that “It” awakens every 30 years in Derry to feast on the town’s children– and that Georgie was one of his victims. The Losers Club decides to set off into the sewers where Pennywise lives in order to put an end to his murderous path.

The second part of the televised series takes place in 1990 and follows the now adult protagonists who regroup once more in order to return to Derry and fight off the shapeshifting Pennywise once more.

This film is an interesting example of a cinematic adaptation that could have benefited from taking even more liberties from the source materials– specifically towards the resolution. Stephen King has a habit of taking his more epic stories to some odd places in their final acts. In the case of King’s 1986 novel, the story climaxes in Pennywise’s sanctum– deep within the sewer. There, It takes its true form, which is apparently a giant alien spider.

In addition to this feeling a little out of place in the miniseries, the fact that the special effects weren’t up to par also hindered the effectiveness of the Losers Club’s final battle with It.

Of course the highlight of this adaptation is Tim Curry’s (The Rocky Horror Picture Show) performance as Pennywise. Curry steals every single scene he’s in, performing the demented character with a wonderfully creepy glee– even though most of the scenes he plays opposite various lackluster performances of the Loser’s Club both in child and adult form.

It’s a little depressing that after the release of 2017’s cinematic interpretation of Stephen King’s It, the first adaptation miniseries released in 1990 is now seen as an afterthought. And that probably shouldn’t come as a surprise. The 2017 feature is undeniably a finer and more effective presentation of Stephen King’s haunting town of Derry. Its special effects are state-of-the-art; its child cast is superb; and its direction is chilling.

But for those who grew up with the two-part 192-minute original miniseries, It was a nightmare-inducing spectacle that left every viewer permanently afflicted with intense coulrophobia– even if the 1990 television movie peters out during its latter half into a lackluster affair.

Stephen King’s It” is available on DVD, blu ray, and digital download here on Amazon. And be sure to check out the other entries in the Stephen King Horror-Thon right here on Horror Theory!

Barry Falls Jr
Barry was the managing editor of his university newspaper before contributing as a freelance content creator for Yahoo News and Esquire. He founded Horror Theory in 2014 to analyze horror films through a sociological lens.

Latest articles

Don’t Breathe (2016): The Urban Decay of Deindustrialized Detroit and United State’s Neglect of Veterans

2016 was a big year for horror films featuring home invasions. Hush showcased Oculus director Mike Flanagan’s exhilarating twist with a hearing-impaired...

Green Room (2015): The Festering Ultra-Violent Rage of ‘Angry White Males’ in Pre-Tr*mp America

It probably is not a coincidence that, in 2016, A24 released their horror-thriller masterpiece Green Room the same month that Republican presidential...

The Invitation (2015): The Spiritual Philosophy of Bereavement and the Cult of Social Civility

Tonight is the night our faith becomes real, reads the tagline for The Invitation, the psychological horror thriller that chronicles the dinner...

We Are Still Here (2015): The Supernatural Dread of Denial, Grief, and Rural Isolationism

There’s a reason why haunted-house films are such a welcomed mainstay in the horror genre. The house as a safe space and...

The Witch (2015): The Self-Fulfilling Prophecy of Puritan Moral Panic and Patriarchal Family Dynamics

The 2010s marked a notable resurgence of religious themes and imagery in horror film. Perhaps most faithful to theological folklore was 2015’s...

It Follows (2014): Sex, Nostalgia, and The Existential Dread of Emerging Adulthood

Sex and horror have been tethered together in film since the genre's beginnings. Horror cinema remains one of the sharpest means for...

ADVERTISEMENT

ADVERTISMENT

Related articles

ADVERTISMENT