Post by erik on Oct 13, 2012 23:45:14 GMT -5
Quote by Carrie (Sissy Spacek) to her mother (Piper Laurie) in CARRIE:
"It's got nothin' to do with Satan, Momma. It's me! Me! If I concentrate hard enough, I can move things."
With all the concerns we have nowadays about schoolyard bullying and social rejection leading to acts of extreme violence like what we saw at Columbine and Virginia Tech, it is important to recognize that a film made back in the late 1970s, a horror film no less, seemed to foresee these things. That film was CARRIE, the 1976 film based on the debut novel by Stephen King that became one of the iconic films of its genre during that time, and has endured because these days it seems to be more than just a horror movie.
Sissy Spacek, in a role that almost snagged her an Oscar, is the socially-ostracized high school student who is consistently bullied and harassed by her more "snooty" female classmates in gym class because she is extremely shy and reserved. If anything, however, her home life is even worse, far worse, because her mother (Laurie) is a thoroughly deranged right-wing religious fanatic who inculcates the notion that any kind of sex is a sin. The stage is set when, after the PE teacher (Betty Buckley) disciplines the class for tormenting Spacek in the shower stall, one of them (Nancy Allen) takes umbrage and plots a devious revenge with her boyfriend (John Travolta). Meanwhile, the most repentant girl (Amy Irving) agrees to let her boyfriend (William Katt) accompany Spacek to the senior prom.
What none of them knows, however, is that Spacek has just found out about her hidden ability to move things by the force of her own mind--Telekinesis. And when Spacek, having won the prom queen award in a rigged vote, is gruesomely humiliated with pig's blood being dumped on her by Allen....
...all Hell literally breaks loose in the gym in a violent firestorm:
It isn't likely that either King or the director of the film, Brian DePalma, had any idea what they had on their hands when the film was made in 1976. And it was a bit too easy for a lot of critics (even those who praised the film, and there were more than a few who did) to dismiss this as another, albeit well-made, horror film. Given the real-life horrors of Columbine and Virginia Tech, however, it isn't so easy to dismiss CARRIE anymore. On a budget of just under $2 million, CARRIE went on to gross $60 million, making it one of the most profitable horror films of its time. Spacek's performance in the tortured title character role is so incredible, possibly the best one ever given by any actress in a genre where most of the time all they ever are allowed to do is scream. The 10-minute sequence from the time her and Katt's win is announced to her walking out of the gym as the fire rages is incredibly dramatic, suspenseful, and even a bit nausea-producing, aided by the use of slow-motion and Pino Donnagio's score, clearly influenced by Bernard Herrmann (who would have worked on it had he not passed away right before the end of 1975).
Although it must inevitably seem dated in places, the whole nature of the story, and its theme of societal forces colliding and resulting in an explosion of pain and death, means that CARRIE has remained timeless in ways that only the top echelon of horror films have ever managed to.
"It's got nothin' to do with Satan, Momma. It's me! Me! If I concentrate hard enough, I can move things."
With all the concerns we have nowadays about schoolyard bullying and social rejection leading to acts of extreme violence like what we saw at Columbine and Virginia Tech, it is important to recognize that a film made back in the late 1970s, a horror film no less, seemed to foresee these things. That film was CARRIE, the 1976 film based on the debut novel by Stephen King that became one of the iconic films of its genre during that time, and has endured because these days it seems to be more than just a horror movie.
Sissy Spacek, in a role that almost snagged her an Oscar, is the socially-ostracized high school student who is consistently bullied and harassed by her more "snooty" female classmates in gym class because she is extremely shy and reserved. If anything, however, her home life is even worse, far worse, because her mother (Laurie) is a thoroughly deranged right-wing religious fanatic who inculcates the notion that any kind of sex is a sin. The stage is set when, after the PE teacher (Betty Buckley) disciplines the class for tormenting Spacek in the shower stall, one of them (Nancy Allen) takes umbrage and plots a devious revenge with her boyfriend (John Travolta). Meanwhile, the most repentant girl (Amy Irving) agrees to let her boyfriend (William Katt) accompany Spacek to the senior prom.
What none of them knows, however, is that Spacek has just found out about her hidden ability to move things by the force of her own mind--Telekinesis. And when Spacek, having won the prom queen award in a rigged vote, is gruesomely humiliated with pig's blood being dumped on her by Allen....
...all Hell literally breaks loose in the gym in a violent firestorm:
It isn't likely that either King or the director of the film, Brian DePalma, had any idea what they had on their hands when the film was made in 1976. And it was a bit too easy for a lot of critics (even those who praised the film, and there were more than a few who did) to dismiss this as another, albeit well-made, horror film. Given the real-life horrors of Columbine and Virginia Tech, however, it isn't so easy to dismiss CARRIE anymore. On a budget of just under $2 million, CARRIE went on to gross $60 million, making it one of the most profitable horror films of its time. Spacek's performance in the tortured title character role is so incredible, possibly the best one ever given by any actress in a genre where most of the time all they ever are allowed to do is scream. The 10-minute sequence from the time her and Katt's win is announced to her walking out of the gym as the fire rages is incredibly dramatic, suspenseful, and even a bit nausea-producing, aided by the use of slow-motion and Pino Donnagio's score, clearly influenced by Bernard Herrmann (who would have worked on it had he not passed away right before the end of 1975).
Although it must inevitably seem dated in places, the whole nature of the story, and its theme of societal forces colliding and resulting in an explosion of pain and death, means that CARRIE has remained timeless in ways that only the top echelon of horror films have ever managed to.
