Pet Sematary Directors Discuss Big Change From Novel (Spoilers)

Warning: This article discusses a major spoiler from Pet Sematary.

The directors for Pet Sematary have discussed a major change from the Stephen King novel that was revealed in the new trailer. Dennis Widmyer and Kevin Kolsch spoke in a press kit (per Bloody Disgusting) about the fact that in the new film, it’s Ellie Creed and not Gage who dies and comes back.

“That twist was in the script when we came on board, and straight away you could see that it was one of the smartest things in the script. It was new and fresh but also absolutely kept the essence of the novel,” Widmyer said. “One of the things we liked about the novel is that it’s always the character of Ellie who is asking about these things. She’s asking about her cat dying one day and asking all these big questions. So, it felt right for it to be her, to echo these questions to her Dad, to resolve these earlier conversations that we’ve had. It felt like a nice way to connect that theme.”

Kolsch added, “You’ve got to be sure that you’re making changes for the right reasons, not just a shock factor. And changing it to Ellie makes absolute sense to the story.”

Producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura said of the change, “I’ve been lucky enough to have worked on something like 80 different book or graphic novel [adaptations]. And I think the truth of any success is that if you treat it literally you get in trouble because it feels very static and stale. But if you make too many changes then you’ve lost the essence of what it is. This treads the perfect line. It is about embracing what the book is trying to say, and not trying to change its tone, its rhythm and its perspective, while also evolving things forward.”

Pet Sematary is set to release on April 5th.