**If you haven’t seen the new trailer for the upcoming “Pet Sematary” remake, consider the below to be spoilers. However, if you were unaware that you should have skipped the trailer (like me), you can read the directors try to explain why it’s not really a spoiler. Enjoy!**
I can’t sit here and say that writing about movies is a tough job. It’s not easy, sure. Writing, in general, isn’t something that everyone is able to do. However, I’m not curing cancer or working 12 hours a day in a factory, so it’s all relative. That being said, one of the more difficult aspects of my job is that people who write about films and TV shows have to watch trailers. There’s no way around it. Normally, it’s not such a big deal, as studios have been better and better about hiding plot points. But that’s not what happened in the latest trailer for “Pet Sematary.”
As mentioned in the above spoiler warning, the new trailer for “Pet Sematary” is great…until it’s not. Everything we’ve seen about the film, up to the spoilerific part of the last trailer has been really superb, presenting a film that is sure to delight fans of Stephen King novels and horror films. But then you reach the point in the trailer when it’s revealed that the young daughter in the film is killed and brought back to life using the evil forces. It’s clearly a pivotal moment in the film, and one of the “twists” that you would expect in a horror film. So, why the hell did the studio give it away in the trailer?
Speaking to Collider, the film’s directors Dennis Widmyer and Kevin Kölsch attempt to explain.
“Yeah, we would not have done that, but we don’t work in marketing,” said Widmyer. “But I will say though, to their credit, that we tested the film in a bunch of different cities, as you always do with studio films, and our score went up after the trailer was revealed.”
He continued, “I’m not saying it was because of that. We had made the movie better obviously in between, but I don’t know. There is something to be said about people sort of knowing going in already what to expect and then being ready for it rather than blindsided by it if they’re not into it.”
If it wasn’t frustrating enough that the deal of the little girl is shown in the trailer, fans of the original King story were extra upset because the surprise of the daughter dying and not the son, Gage (who bites it in the novel and first film), is completely ruined.
“Yeah, it’d be great to live in an alternate reality where it was different and to see how people responded to it, but I don’t know,” the filmmaker said. “Let’s say you were into the movie the whole time and you were enjoying the movie, but in your heart of hearts you were waiting for Gage to die. And then in that moment he didn’t die. It doesn’t necessarily mean you’re gonna go, ‘Oh my god! Wow, they got me!’ You might just go, ‘F this. I don’t want that,’ you know?”
READ MORE: ‘Pet Sematary’ Trailer: Sometimes Dead Is Better In Another Stephen King Remake
As Kölsch explained, however, there is a precedent for showing the death of a child in a “Pet Sematary” trailer.
“When you look at the trailer for the original movie, I mean, it shows that Gage comes back,” added Kölsch. “So it’s a plot point of the movie, so calling it a twist or not wanting to reveal that we switched the child – which we were on that team at first! We were like, ‘Ah, let’s keep this secret. It’s gonna hit them so hard in the movie.’ But then you’re going like, ‘Well then you can’t really pitch what the whole movie’s about in your trailer,’ you know?”
Ultimately, it’s clear that the filmmakers were not fully onboard with the decision to reveal the death in the trailer. However, for folks like me, who had the twist spoiled, there are apparently plenty more to get excited about when the film hits theaters on April 5.