It

A horror film set in a small town in Maine in 1988 and 1989. A boy is playing with a paper boat in the rain. The boat goes down a drain and a clown speaks in the dark. Georgie disappears. The number of missing children in the town is far above the national average and nobody talks about it. Over one summer seven children come together. All of them are excluded at school; a stammer, weight, asthma, religion, race and violence at home. Each of them sees something different. The clown becomes whatever each fears most. From there the film is an investigation. A library, old newspapers, a map and an abandoned house. What the narrative is interested in is not the monster but the adults: none of the grown-ups in the town helps and some do the children more harm than the monster. The Beverly line is the clearest case of that and the hardest part of the film. The summer the group spends together is its best material. A rock fight, a stream, bicycles and jokes; the film stands up without the horror scenes. The source is Stephen King's novel. The book runs in two periods; this film tells only the childhood section and moves it from the 1950s of the book to the 1980s. The project was in another director's hands for a long time; after he left it was rebuilt. The film reached the highest worldwide box office for a horror film to that date. Jaeden Martell, Sophia Lillis, Finn Wolfhard, Jeremy Ray Taylor and Bill Skarsgård are in the cast. Andy Muschietti directed. Who it is for: anyone who likes 1980s stories about a group of children together with horror. Who it is not for: anyone who dislikes loud sudden shocks; the film uses that device often.