Pet Sematary: Bloodlines review – pointless horror prequel

The stratification of streaming content, divided up by individual studio, forced the manic plundering of back catalogues, turning any old property into a new way to lure in subscribers. It was a mostly cursed tactic, leaving us with unwanted answers to questions no one was bothering to ask: what if Gremlins but animated, what if Grease’s pink ladies but prequel, what if Fatal Attraction but Joshua Jackson and what if Sex and the City but terrible?

Related: Totally Killer review – cheap and cheerful time travel slasher

Unsurprisingly, most of these have failed (And Just Like That boldly continues, redefined as a wine-soaked hate-watch) and as we head toward a contraction of the industry after a record bloat, it seems unlikely that quite as many similar experiments will take place. It leaves a film such as Pet Sematary: Bloodlines feeling even more like a dusty old thing of the past, not just because of its period setting but because of its sheer redundancy, existing just because rather than because of any real reason. Even the film it’s technically linked to, 2019’s barely buffed remake of Pet Sematary, about a devilish cemetery that brings the dead back to life, felt like a step in a pointless direction, only resurrecting the 1989 horror film as a result of author Stephen King’s renewed popularity, 2017’s It: Chapter One making a monstrous $700m worldwide (the highest-grossing horror film of all time).

Just in time for another overstuffed spooky season, Paramount+, the same streamer that dragged the Paranormal Activity franchise back from the beyond for Halloween two years ago, is hoping to eke more blood out of the Pet Sematary with a prequel wanted by few and needed by none.

Set in the dying days of the 1960s in the cursed town of Ludlow, Maine, it follows Jud (Jackson White), a young man trying to get out with his girlfriend, gently pushed away by parents who know what staying there will do to you. But forces conspire to keep them there just a little bit longer, and a little bit deeper into a cemetery full of home town secrets. His childhood friend has returned from Vietnam a little worse for wear leading his father (David Duchovny) to make a doomed decision …

It’s another case of filling in gaps that were fine as is, the story leaping all the way back to the 1670s for an uninspired backstory attempting to make some point about colonialists and stolen land before flashing back forward to make some point about the Vietnam war. But writer-director Lindsey Anderson Beer, best known for Netflix teen hit Sienna Burgess Is a Loser, isn’t able to find a way to make it all feel cohesive enough to make sense, vague nods toward inherited trauma and political callousness tossed aside for a rote quest-led final act.

It’s competently acted and made – her direction easily trumps her writing – and while there’s nothing close to suspense, there are some effectively visceral moments of gore. But not once is she, or anyone else involved here, able to explain why we’re here and in a month filled with horror, that’s an answer that should be more heavily prioritised. Like the many resurrections in the film, it’s a terrible idea.

• Pet Sematary: Bloodlines is out on Paramount+ on 6 October