Pet Sematary: Bloodlines
PARAMOUNTNobody – not fans of the original Pet Sematary, the remake, nor fans of Stephen King's work – expected, or wanted, a prequel to anything but Paramount's lukewarm Kevin Kölsch-directed and Jason Clarke-starring 2019 remake. Yet, four years later, and released in nothing short of a whimper, arrives in Lindsey Beer's Pet Sematary: Bloodlines. Surprisingly devised as a prequel but without any direct or correlating links to the 2019 version, nor the 1989 original for that matter, Beer's film follows that of a young Jud Crandall, played by John Lithgow in the 2019 version, and here by Jacob Elrodi lookalike Jackson White, who slowly but surely becomes embroiled in undead secrets in the town of Ludlow.
Surprisingly, Bloodlines further tries to craft a mythology within this franchise, not in terms of wanting to be given an excuse to follow younger characters, as what this feature at first glance suggests but attempts to craft a bigger narrative with a larger history and lore. The result? A commendable DTV effort that approaches a larger scale of this franchise but can't elevate the material or screenplay to craft a venture that deserves to be made nor stand out against its contemporaries.
The positive here is that Pet Sematary: Bloodlines is absolutely fine. It never makes a true misstep; never looking awful in aesthetic value or showcases moments of budget restraints. It is, at a very basic level, horror entertainment. Granted, this is a franchise that has never positioned itself as elevated horror or been given the expectations of high-brow audiences, with all due respect. The fallout from such mundane, monotone production is that it never stands out or goes against the grain. In one such manner is the casting of Henry Thomas, who is typecasted and fine as Dan Crandall but he’s now in almost every other Stephen King adaption known to man; Thomas furthers a bigger issue that this franchise wants or could explore. The whole premise here is the abuse and horror of an Indian burial ground, yet every adaption constantly fails to want to explore this mythology aside from verbal exposition. Here a very small but terrific amount of expositional visual story explores this root. It is horrifying, entertaining and yet sparingly too short and undeniably should have truly been the majority of this venture. Instead, Bloodlines wants to create a Children of the Corn like venture into a town that knows it has a little secret and has a secret society to stop this undead from rising due to the grief of their loved ones. The issue is that it is all so predictable, obvious and never thrilling to know exactly what is happening on screen or know exactly what the characters are thinking. Bloodlines never leaves anything for the audience to think or feel on their own.
Jackson White and Henry Thomas, for almost the entire runtime, speak in indirect riddles which just further the already-known mystique until the film simply has to go straight-laced and say it how it is. Both do fine jobs in their respective roles, but neither is given true charm or emotive immersion. Specifically, Thomas is so stoic to a point that it drives the viewer almost insane with the sheer amount of dodging around without actually saying anything. White is then, unfortunately, almost exclusively relegated to respond to said screenplay quotations in a manner which slowly but surely gets more aggressive in the audience's eyes and ears as the film goes on. White and Thomas have the only real amount of depth on screen and due to the stoic nature of the the plot, it never flourishes or emotive or vulnerable for the events of what is about to proceed. White has two further partnerships to craft this emotive immersion, one is through the equally as stoic and internalised performance of Forrest Goodluck as Manny and girlfriend Natalie Alyn Lind as Norma. Surprisingly, Bloodlines gives more screen presence to Goodluck and White to craft this narrative immersion, rather than what feels obvious and what the venture uses as emotional immersion in the latter half of the film in Alyn Lind's Norma. This seems like seismic oversight, or lack thereof, of what would make the climax feel all the more memorable, intense and grim. Yet, Bloodlines pushes and regulates Alyn Lind's Norma to the sidelines as a third party, and for the most part, cheaply brought in for a climatic use of emotional manipulation, rather than the deserved emotive investment the film is desperately trying to covey.
Made stranger is the feature that puts quite a substantial secondary story arc to Goodluck's Manny and on-screen sister Isabella Star LaBlanc's Donna. Both of whom have a terrific chemistry and emotionally captivating storyline that feeds into the mythology of this franchise, who so easily could have been explored and led this venture into a new direction. But alas, they are just used as empty emotive pawns for the actions of their antagonist. This is where the feature hits its high and low in the very same breath. Without spoiling anything, Bloodlines follows family dynamics and how far one will go to help, shield and protect said dynamic – even with horrible results. The film just about nails the iconography, the horror and the atmosphere in its villain, and to its credit, nails certain iconography and set design in its climatic battle. But dear, oh dear, does it poorly execute the character of David Duchovny; what an absolute shambles of a character and thus performance, which not only feels comatose but actively disinterested? It is shocking how poorly devised said character is in its arc, one moment the stoic embodiment of a hidden agenda and the next a tonal opposing force who will right the wrongs. All were achieved in genuinely thirty seconds of screen time.
This is what ultimately pains this experience: at its fingertips, it offers a unique dynamic upon a comatose franchise that is brooding with flavour and flair, only to rest on the morals of its predecessors without doing anything remotely interesting. Hinging on the merits of very simplistic production and sound design methods for far too long and far too frequently for this venture to just settle on using. It wastes truly great character actors in Henry Thomas, Pam Grier and David Duchovny, throwing away the central core of what potential this vehicle has in mythology to retreat the same paths documented and previously explored, what can only be described as being extremely cheap in terms of depth, and one that sadly does not give credence of existing.
