“’IT’” is a hard R.”

After hearing this from the ticket collector as I walked into the movie theatre, I didn’t know what to expect from “IT”. Upon leaving the theatre, two hours and 15 minutes later, I had an empty bucket of popcorn, a new fear of red balloons and the immense satisfaction one gets from watching a really good horror movie.

“IT”, directed by Andy Muschietti, is a unique horror movie that does not hold back; it not only frightens the audience with the unrelenting presence of a killer clown, but also ties in the equally as scary, if not more terrifying, horrors of real life that haunt us from day to day.

It, who refers to itself  as Pennywise the Dancing Clown, has haunted the small town of Derry, Maine, for centuries. In the summer of 1988, children in Derry start to disappear without a trace, and it is up to a clan of misfits, who call themselves  the “Losers’ Club” to team up and destroy it.

Pennywise, played by Swedish actor Bill Skarsgård, is truly menacing. Towering at 7 feet tall and adorned with a floating, red balloon in almost every scene, his presence on the screen is impossible to ignore. His portrayal of the twisted clown is original, unsettling and terrifying.

The acting done by children in the Losers’ Club is phenomenal. Each misfit in the group comes with baggage; however, their unique backgrounds and fears are what really unite them.

The group is lead by Bill Denbrough, played by Jaeden Liberher, who struggles with a stutter and rallies the kids look for his missing brother, Georgie. Eddie Kaspbrak, played by Jack Dylan Grazer, and Richie Tozier, played by “Stranger Things” star Finn Wolfhard, are other notable characters in the film that have great on-screen chemistry.

The movie provided a lot of comedic relief to counteract the chilling scenes. The bickering between the children in the Losers’ Club is genuine, 12-year-old dialogue that most movies aren’t able to perfect. “Your mom” jokes, swearing, awkwardness around girls and Bar Mitzvahs all work together to create a realistic portrayal of the life of pre-pubescent middle schoolers on summer break.

If you’re afraid of clowns, don’t worry, because Pennywise really wasn’t on the screen that often. In the first hour of the movie, Pennywise would periodically show himself, but it would only last for about one-to-two minutes.

Pennywise wasn’t the only antagonist in the movie. In fact, the kids in the Losers’ Club were the only ones portrayed in a positive light. All of the adults in the community seemed to working against the children and their quest. This further illustrated that all of the odds were against the children­­­; without each other, they could achieve nothing.

Beyond watching the torture Pennywise puts the Losers’ Club through, the movie also sheds light on the realistic, chilling fears that plague millions of people everyday. Some of the scariest scenes in the movie exclude Pennywise entirely, but instead include bullying, sexual assault, and abuse. The movie illustrates how ugly the world we live in is, and how, for some people, the fear I experienced while watching the movie is an everyday reality.