Movie Review: Carrie 1976

 

Hey everyone, my name is Anthony and welcome back to my Movie Review.

You know my friends, ever since i review movies, i've done some movies that are based on books, the most common that i've reviewed is from comics like DC and Marvel, but i've done my review of movies that are based on novels, sure i reviewed The Jungle Book (both the original and Favreau's version), Die Hard (though loosely based on "Nothing Lasts Forever), Who Framed Roger Rabbit (But the title was reversed to "censor", not Frame in the novel) and couple others if i forgot. But i've never done a movie that was based on what many considered as the greatest author ever, Stephen King. Im sure lot of you are familar of Mr. King, he's famous for writing a horror stories with novels, my dad used to read King's novels, it was fascinating and scary at the same time, and its no secret that i gotta do one movie that was considered as "The one that started all".

"Carrie" is a 1976 supernatural horror film that was directed by the great Brian De Palma, produced by Paul Monash and written by Lawrence D. Cohen.

This was based on Stephen King's very first novel he ever published and the fourth one he ever wrote from two years. Before the film was released, King came up the idea of a girl in the show with telekinetic power before chaos occurred from bullies, but he had a hard time to figure out what to do for the story development that he threw three papers in a garbage, but his wife Tabitha King looked at his pages and and encouraged him that it wasn't so bad and helping him to expanding his novel, and she helped him very well, since when the novel came out, even though his book had a modest performance, but it was well-received from critics and audience. It was so good that it became an inspiration project from Lawrence D. Cohen (due to being familiar from King's manuscript) and gave it to Brian De Palma in order to give it a shot after King accepted it got paid 2500 dollars for the film rights.

Of course, when this movie came out, it because a legendary, critics and audience loved this movie as one of the greatest horror film ever and as i said, it became the first film adaptation from Stephen King's work, so good in fact that not only the helped to sold more books, but also made inspiration from many filmmakers to make their adaptation King's novels. and the box-office was an instant hit with over $33.8 million (United States and Canada), and the film received two nominations from Academy awards with Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress.

Though i never have a chance to see it, bit i've heard the name when i read the book of movies in my old school and my parents had a fond memory of this film for how scary and beautiful they've ever seen. So, il give it a shot to watching on DVD.

So, with all that said, does Carrie deserves a respect to this day, or is this film deserved a pig bloody shower in prom night?

Well, lets find out.

The Story

As always, im not gonna do a comparison between the book and the film, since i didn't have the first published book that King ever wrote, but when it comes to the story, it was well-written and quite of difficult to watch.

The movie quickly opens on the school where we introduced our titular girl named "Carrie White", a student who's mistreated as an outcast. After lost the volleyball, she ended up being humiliated by Norma's red hat smack and big B**** Chris Hargensen telling her to Eat S***. After an opening montage of ladies in locker room (and yup, you can see boobs and bushes in a theatrical film, even if i was uncomfortable to see those, since this is an R-Rated movie), Carrie is in a nice and warm shower (which im assuming is to refresh herself from bully, but that was just the beginning), but not before she got her First Period (aka having her hand bleeding out from menstrual bleeding), causing her to panic about the situation, but the girls refused to helping her by not only pushing to the corner, but also throwing tampons to "Plug it up!". That is until gym teacher Miss Collins intervenes the girls to stop screwing around that she comes to comfort Carrie, along with light bulb breaking out of nowhere from Carrie's telekinetic power. After Principal Morton accepted to let her going back home with a brain damage to calling her "Cassie" (despite Carrie yelling at for her own name with flipping off an ashtray and pushing the boy in the bike down, latter of which that the boy was actually dubbed.), she want back home to see her mother Margaret, but instead, she also got mistreated, this time, her mother is an insane religious believer to accusing her daughter to live with sin by dragging her to the closet what she called "praying closet" for harsh punishment. By next day, Carrie heard there's a prom plan that she has no plan about it, that until one girl, Sue Snell, though that not only she lets Tommy Ross go, but also having Tommy to be with Carrie, while Chrissy was pissed from being scolded by Miss Collins for being suspended for three days and being banned from prom, she called her lover Billy Nolan for revenge. So its up to Carrie for trying to be confident for Tommy, while Sue is hoping for the best, despite she better watch from bullies when she's off from prom.

This film is quite of emotional ride to get through, mainly the movie how Carrie is pretty much humiliated from the bullies and her fanatic religious mother, its easy to know she's use as a tragic figure throughout the movie, especially when she has near uncontrollable telekinesis. Though we all know today, with have some butthurt people who thinks the whole place is out to get him or her, but this one is depicted a heartfelt and taking it rather seriously to easily to understand how we felt for Carrie White. Plus, i like the sub-plot where Sue tries to find the way to cheer Carrie up after bullied her and being warned from suspension by Miss Collins, even though we all know she has nothing to do with the trick or even bullying, he just plan to bring his lover Tommy away to Carrie, especially that she decided to separating from Chris that she knew Chrissy is a Queen B. Of course, about her telekinetic power, its not easy to know how she has it, either she was born with it or her insane mother believes she has a power from the sin that she accused for. Though the movie is rather taking forever, but at least its nice and feel for the build up for the prom moment, from Chris planning out with Billy, the aforementioned Sue gives Tommy away to Carrie for cancelling her plan of prom to Miss Collins comforting Carrie to think positive, as well as punishing the student girls in a detention workout with zonky music. Yeah, the movie is kinda add some silly moments, one the scene with Tommy and his pals in a clothing shop where one time it fast-forward in a seconds, i don't know why, but my guess its to not cut away their conversation. Aw well.

Despite some slight of flaws, it is a well-written film how we feel sorry for Carrie being treated as an outcast of the school.

The Presentation

For a movie with a cheap budget of 1.8 million dollars, the presence of this film is surprisingly looks well-done and beautiful.

For the filming, the White's house (Not the USA's White House) is filmed on Santa Paula, California in order to give a religious and gothic-like for the setting in the house, which is a nice place to film, along with the school filmed in Pacific Pallisades High School (though sometimes in the climatic scene (which il talk about it later) were filmed on sound stage, despite the stage ended up catching fire) and they called it "Bates High School" (Which is an obvious reference from Psycho). Another fascinating filming location is where Crhis, Billy and their other friends going to the farm to kill the pig for a bucket of blood is filmed on an impressive wall-painting of Farmer John, located on Vernon, California and interesting note, it was discovered by Bill Paxton before going acting career with Aliens (Game over, man! Game over!).

Plus, the filmography is not only beautiful, but also impressive with various tricks, the first of which is what its called "Split-diopter lens", which is basically filming with in a same position, but with two focal planes, one of is the actor gets closer at the camera and other is the actor(s) far away from the camera in order to make a somewhat like a split-screen. Its a pretty nice idea back then, even if you can see the blur got cut in a half away from the actor.

Another memorable tricky filming is the one long take in 8-figure style in the prom scene, mainly after the vote with Tommy and Carrie, it follows Norma for secret plan, then goes to Chris and Billy for bloody bucket plan bellow the Prom Queen stage, then moves behind the stage of Sue checking in, going up the bucket of pig blood and zooms to going back to Tom and Carrie. It is amazing and the most challenging one-take ever, according to Mario Tosi, they took 30 takes to be perfect as they could for De Palma, despite the studio are unpleased for the difficulty task that De Palma stood his ground of this situation.

As for the effect and some designs, they're quite nice what they went for. For the designs, the clothing and the actors looks are quite nice and old-fashion, you know for 70's movie, raging from stylish to some are creepy, including one of which is a creepy crucifix sculpture of Saint-Sebastian, which it was designed by an Art director Jack Fisk.

For the effect, they're all done in practical, most of moments where Carrie uses telekinesis are obviously done with invisible wires (though there's one shot that you can easily see a near visible wire) like flying knives, hovering fire hose, an elevator for the White's house crumbling down from Carrie's final breakdown, and the help of stunt coordinator Dick Ziker for building a canon bellow the car with a sawed off telephone pole where he pressed the button from the steering wheel, it blasts the canon from bellow to go boom, and thankfully, everybody are all alright from this stunt.

Speaking of stunt, i can probably noticing some stunts could be risky, like where Carrie stood 12 inches away from the fire in sound stage before the stage ended catching fire as i said before, there's the scene where Betty Buckley slapping at Nancy Allen's face for the purpose of realistic reaction, though the numbers of slapping in the face are debatable either 10, 12 or even 29 (Jeez ma'am, talk about nearly abusive in order to be realistic) or the worst situation is the scene where Norma got hit by a fire hose, where P.J. Soles turned her head with a water pressure at her ear, which is a dangerous ear hazard that'll causing an ear drum's bursting (Yeah, feel sorry for Mrs. Soles from a painful situation).

I also like to point out the composure soundtrack by Pino Donaggio that he did a beautiful work from the beauty feel and disturbing moments, especially the use of the strings when Carrie uses her telekinetic power, which it sounds similar to the shower attack scene from Psycho by Bernard Hermann. (that's two reference from Psycho, maybe il review it in the future)

One last thing, since this is a film adaptation of Stephen King and sorta horror film, there's always gotta be a body counts, though the film is more of tragic figure of our titular girl got bullied than killing, the killing the climatic is quite of horrifying. Thanks to Dead Meat's Kill Count (which i watched it before i watch the movie, mainly for fun of seeing characters get killed and learning from behind scenes), the movie has 73 kills. Quite of number for this movie, though its thanks to the sequel "Rage: Carrie 2" when Sue mentioned the incident.

The film's presence is beautifully done for the quality, the effects, the design and the composure, aside for my concern about some risky situations from people are ok to some who got hurt.

The Characters

For a movie about mistreatment to a girl with telekinetic power and flock of bullies and one crazy religious mother, its no surprising that they're memorable and even downright mean-spirited.

Lets start with our titular girl Carrie White (played by Sissy Spacek), a main girl with telekinetic power that she was treated very badly from bullies in the school to her neglectful mother for belief of religion. She's definitely the protagonist that you felt bad for her, down to the point that no matter how many times she got bad treatments, she'll reach her limit from her power from breaking light bulb, pushing a bike kid down to fight back her mother with closing doors and windows and mind-pushing her. This is something that anybody should've been warned behind her telekinesis how she got humiliated over and over. Sissy did a great work of her main role of her tragic character and its no wonder why she's nominated for Best Actress from the 49th Academy Award. Fun note, she's with Jack Fisk while making the movie and they were married since 1974 (two years before Carrie) and they're still together to this day. Nice.

Next up is first antagonist of the movie, Margaret White (played by Piper Laurie), She's easily the worst mother in the movie, due to the fact that at first, she seems to be nice at anybody for respect with Jesus, but once her daughter came in, she's going insanely mad to accusing Carrie with sin, due to using her telekinesis with smacking her face with her book to dragging her to the closet. This is one of those mother in the movie that you love to hate from her mean-spirited persona based on her religious belief that she'll always stand up to insulting anybody with sins for her pointing out, especially for her insulting treatment of Carrie. Im not saying i hate Piper, Piper is a talented actress that she came out of hiatus after her successful role of The Hustler (which she got nominated for Best Actress) and she also got nominated from Academy Award, this time, for Best Supporting Actress. But we all know that Margaret is such a mean-spirited mother we've ever seen.

Speaking of mean B****, next is Chris Hargensen (played by Nancy Allen), the second antagonist for being a big mean girl in the school she always want to standing her ground against Carrie with other girls. In other words, she's not only a mean girl, but also a manipulative B**** to putting Carrie off the picture for bullying with other girls and her lover Billy. She's another mean-spirited character that, like Carrie's broken down mother, we love to hating her based on her careless at Carrie and manipulative at anyone, although we always like to see her get humiliated back by Miss Collins from the shower scene. Like before, no disrespect for Nancy Allen, she did a great job of her role, but im not a huge fan of a character being so mean-spirited to putting Carrie down in embarrassment and manipulation. Although Nancy did got married with Brian De Palma for about five years (though their marriage came from 1979, three years after Carrie).

Next up we have Sue Snell (played by Amy Irving), a student who used to bully, but eventually changed her heart after Carrie got humiliated from the shower after her First Period. Despite she was facing consequences, she turned against Chrissy to having her lover Tommy to give Carrie a chance to be happy than humiliating. Its easily to say that Sue another memorable character for her changing role from bully to feel sorry for Carrie for her goal, we can related that after we bullied, we change our feeling for the victim to have a sympathy and Amy did a nice work of her role. Oh btw, quick note, she was originally going to playing as Princess Leia from Star Wars, but as we all know, Carrie Fisher took over, and as they say, was history. Which it explained why she focuses on Carrie. Aw well.

Speaking of character with sympathy, we have Miss Collins (played by Betty Buckly), a gym teacher who has a sympathy on Carrie when she got bullied in the shower scene and punishing student girls. She's another memorable, we can feel her that she felt sorry for Carrie and helps her to think positive, even though she didn't realizing about Carrie's insane mother, but at least she helps her to be confident for prom. Of course, Betty did a great work of her role for heart to heart. Lastly, she did the dubbing voice of a bicycle kid (who played by Brian De Palma's son, Cameron).

Then we have Tommy Ross (played by William Katt), who's Sue's girlfriend that when Sue tells about a terrible situation about Carrie, he's gonna be Carrie's love interest in order to changing her life. He's obviously used as a plot purpose in order to change Carrie's life in the prom while Sue was planning to do without making another mess (or so we said). I find him not bad and likable to cheer Carrie up and Katt did a nice work too. Speaking of Sue, William was also originally to be in Star Wars as Luke Skywalker, but like always, Mark Hamill took over, and the rest is history.

And lastly that i wanna talk about (though not as long) is Billy Nolan (played by John Travolta, aka Danny Zucko from Grease), he's Chris's lover for her goal to put the final nail in the coffin at Carrie, mainly, hunting down a pig for a bucket of pig blood as we all know. Though at first, we though he's just another sleazy character for not a purpose of the movie, but as we know, due to Chris's manipulation to getting into his in his car, he's like her henchman for her bullying goal. Though he may look like a mean-spirited one with slapping her, but he's probably a goofier character, i mean, what do you expect from Travolta's delivery, or heck, do you ever seen Grease? (either that, or il review it if you're curious).

As for the rest of the characters, there's not much, although some of them have a not worthy, but some are just an after thoughts, there's Normal Watson (played by P.J. Soles, aka Lynda "Totally" Klok on Halloween) who's a girl who's wearing a red hat every days, Principal Morton (played by the late Stefan Gierasch), the principal who, aside of some sympathy, but probably a brain damage for misspelling name like in Starbucks and Eleanor Snell (played by Amy Irving's mother Priscilla Pointer) who's Sue's mother, but much nicer and normal than Margaret.

The characters are quite memorable, but we all know that one of them that we have a sympathy, but others are flat out mean towards our protagonist.

SPOILER ALERT if anyone who haven't seen the movie, or if you don't mind.

Once we get to the prom from Tommy's proposal to Carrie, things about to get... Iconic, my friends.

After the preparation montage (almost like a montage), Margaret pleading Carrier to stay from potential humiliation, but Carrie shuts her mother up with Mind Push (or Force Push? Even though this movie came out before Star Wars) and left to Tommy's car to the prom in Bates High School, while some people like Miss Collins are happy for her change, though some like Norma still giggles at her and others got distracted. While Carrie and Tommy sat together on a table, Tom is appreciated for her look as beautiful and asking her to going out, which Carrie is accepted, but before that, its the Prom Queen contest for the vote of beauty, which Tom and Carrie vote themselves for "To the devil with false modesty". After the vote, the paper votes are given away from Norma, but not before we (the viewers) realized that they changed the votes for their secret plan, Chris and Billy are hiding bellow the stage with their bucket of blood trap and Sue coming in to keep her eyes on Carrie. After the result, Carrie and Tommy are announced as the winner of Prom Queen.

After a beautiful slowmo celebration (based on a dreamlike filming style), Sue noticed a rope twitching, which happens to be a bullying prank from Chris and Billy, causing Sue in alert to stop them, but Miss Collins sees Sue as another prankster. picking her to kicking her out of prom, without realization, Chris pulled the trigger to drop the bucket of blood pouring at Carrie in front of the audience, causing her into trauma of humiliation and Billy is pissed from the prank, but not before he got hit by a bucked and knocked unconscious. After Carrie seeing and hearing hallucinations from everyone's laughing and her mother's prediction (Though we see Miss Collins laughing, but then again, its hallucinations), she's going in rage in her ruining prom by using telekinesis to shutting doors, turning lights to red and using fire hose to attacking anybody on her way (including the aforementioned Norma got an ear drum's burst for a risky stunt) and trapping anyone like spraying water at electric pole at Morton and Mr. Fromm and tragically, dropping a basketball backboard to impaling Miss Collins (Depsite she didn't do anything wrong!) and setting the school on fire. As she left the school, Chris and Billy are in a car to noticing Carrie walking alone in attempt to running over, but Carrie sense is tingling by blowing bellow the car to rolling over and kill them with "BOOM!".

After her killing spree (though we only see her action in school and car explosion, due to budget reason to see her more killings) she goes back home in the most fire hazardous candle placements i've ever seen, as she's going up to the bathroom to washing herself from the blood, after its all done, she eventually hugging Margaret, however, Margaret made a confession to her daughter, she wanted to committing suicide when she used to be with her husband Ralph in order to have a sex-less marriage without causing a sin, but it didn't matter that he got drunk and had affair which she enjoyed when he touched her before gave a birth of Carrie. Once Carrie understands about the past, Margaret tries to kill her with backstabbing for her blessing of father lord, but Carrier counters her by throwing knives at her mother with telekinesis! After... Margaret moans in pain, she dies in crucifixion in similar fashion as Saint-Sebastian, and Carrie was very upset for what she's done, causing a mental breakdown her power for not only killing herself, but also crumbling down her house.

After all the madness, in the end, Sue's having a nightmare where she goes to a gravestone of Carrie White, that she's about to give flowers to say sorry, but wouldn't you know it, she got caught by Carrie's hand, causing Sue screaming in agony from a nightmare with her mom.

Ohh man, talk about a horrific and no bittersweet ending for both Carrie and Sue Snell from a Prom's destruction and some body counts. And its no wonder why the climatic scene is the most talked about moments in supernatural film.

And now for my final opinion of this film.

Overall, Carrie is a one helluva movie, its both heartfelt and disturbing.

With well-written story, beautiful filming, a pretty good effects and design and the characters are a great examples for hanging a tragic figure and the mean figures how we felt so bad on Carrie that she went berserk with her power.

Even though it may have some flaws, but its still a very impressive film. This is the film that you should definitely check it out, its gonna disturb you and possibly make you feel sorry for Carrie from humiliations.

With that, im gonna give this movie with a Perfect 10/10 with the Trophy of Success for emotional ride, my friends.

So this ends of my movie review, if you guys have your opinion or any suggestions, let me know at comment bellow and support me on https://ko-fi.com/blackevil.

Thanks for reading, and im Anthony, signing out.