Starring Jaeden Lieberher, Bill Skarsgård, Jeremy Ray Taylor, Sophia Lillis, Finn Wolfhard, Wylatt Oleff, Chosen Jacobs, Jack Dylan Grazer, Nicolas Hamilton

Directed by Andy Muschietti

It’s the summer of ’89, school has just broken up, and a bunch of teens in Derry, Maine are facing an ancient evil that has returned to meet it kid-kill quota.

Something big happens every 27 years. No, I’m not talking about the return of an ancient evil from the sewers of a New England town, but the regularity of IT adaptations. Andy Muschietti’s big-screen adaptation of Chapter One of Stephen King’s monster (in every sense) novel immediately had a hurdle to overcome; the 1990 two-part mini-series might not be a classic – its TV budget and by-the-book direction by Tommy Lee Wallace don’t help – but the one image indelibly etched on people’s minds is Tim Curry as Pennywise the Dancing Clown. With bulbous head, razor teeth and oversized satin and pyjama pompom suit, this creature became the poster boy for the series and the subject of many sleepless nights, and not just for coulrophobes.

When the first big-screen adaptation was announced, initially with Will Poulter as Pennywise and then Bill Skarsgård, many dismissed any possibility that this could be good. How wrong they were.

Like the titular creature in his previous horror movie Mama, Muschietti uses his clown sparingly, coyly keeping him in the shadows or obscured by balloons and thrusting him into the foreground with lolloping limbs. Skarsgård flips from inane drooling grin to predatory shark stare in seconds, a chilling portrayal of ancient evil with rows of razor teeth.

As modern audiences have come to expect, there’s plenty of jump scares and the sort of jerky monster moves that dominate the Conjuring universe. A mix of practical makeup and CGI, Pennywise often recalls a malevolent Beetlejuice, and it’s no coincidence that Tim Burton’s Batman is referenced on a movie theatre’s marquee – Jack Nicholson’s portrayal of the Joker is certainly channelled. And there’s also a little bit of Freddy Krueger playing his morbid dream games (A Nightmare on Elm Street 5 is on at the movies in this very cine-literate environment) particularly when presenters on the TV start talking to real-world characters, with Pennywise smirking in the background.

The movie tackles the ‘past’ section of the book – I’m loathe to say the first half, as the novel’s narrative flips between past and present – meaning that this a more linear telling of the tale. Wisely resisting the urge to cover the whole tale in one three-hour sitting, this 80s-set first part clocks in at a very respectable 135 minutes. While it understandably does strip out a far amount of King’s text, all the major beats are still there.

And what of the kids? This self-named Losers’ Club is a magnificent seven of young actors, each dealing with problems at home that are in many ways as all-consuming as their battle with the town’s evil. Its Amblin-tastic setting inevitably leads to comparisons with The Goonies and ET, as well as King’s own Stand By Me and any one of his Castle Rock-set movies of the 80s. There’s also a sense of Super 8 and Stranger Things, themselves based on this defining period in kid-centred sci-fi fantasy. The clown scares and horror mayhem also owe a lot to Poltergeist.

Jaeden Lieberher (Midnight Special) is great as Bill, desperately trying to find missing younger brother Georgie, which is a diversion from the book, where the child’s body is found immediately. It’s a useful device to explain why Bill has such knowledge in the Derry sewage system. Finn Wolfhard (Stranger Things) is also memorable as trash-talking Richie, the annoying comedian of the group, and thankfully they’ve dialled back his propensity to keep talking in comedy voices. Best of all is Sophia Lillis as tomboy Bev, uncannily like a young Amy Adams. It’s easy to see why she becomes the object of the boys’ adolescent affections, while she copes with an abusive home life. And a mention for Nicholas Hamilton as bully Henry Bowers; it’s a thankless role, but by seeing the way he too is bullied by his father (now a police officer) it adds a layer of context.

Annabelle: Creation‘s Benjamin Wallfisch is also a key to the success, avoiding the obvious circus clown music or John Carpenter synths, instead opting for an exciting orchestral John Williams/ Jerry Goldsmith hybrid.

Liberties are taken with the book – some parents of the kids have already died, and some characters die sooner than in the book – and a whole lot of pages are condensed. There’s also a clunky ‘Chekhov’s gun’ moment where you say ‘I’ll be seeing that again before the end’ but what a rush this is.

The joy of the movie is the way in which it crams so much nostalgia and genre nods for the older viewers while also being fresh and relevant for the younger crowd, who were whooping and squealing throughout. There’s no subtlety in this movie and I laughed out loud when I saw just how much of a haunted house the haunted house looks; imagine the Bates mansion crossed with something out of Scooby-Doo and you’re there. But I guess that’s because we’re riding a cinematic equivalent of a ghost train, bursting through the doors into another chamber of horrors, waiting to see what next is thrown at us.

Verdict: We all float down here, and this beast will deservedly float right to the top of the box office. The big question now of course is how long we’ll have to wait for Chapter Two… and who will be cast as the adults. In the meantime, kick back and wallow in this creepy, exciting, occasionally gory monster-fest, which is the best Stephen King adaptation in many years – possibly since Misery. Which was 27 years ago… 9/10

Nick Joy