"CARRIE"

I decided it was time for me to see the movie “Carrie.” After watching, I now know why my dad was a bit reluctant to name me Carrie (Kari). I know that there is already a post discussing the plot of this particular film, therefore I will spend little time really summarizing the plot step by step.

Carrie is a quiet, almost innocent looking, high school girl. As watching you really seem to feel bad for her. She is teased by all the other girls at school and who knows what all her mother is doing to her throughout this film. Her mother is very religious woman, almost to extremes, that won’t let her daughter be a teenage girl. You just have this very weird feeling whenever in the presence of the mother. Her daughter starts her period and for some reason this sends her into a frenzy. It is all very strange and unsettling.

I believe this film really shows an example of Freeland’s art-dread, with a mixture of Carroll and Schneider in there to some degree. The whole movie you just have this feeling that something isn’t right. It was unnerving, disturbing, and there’s just this sense of anxiety. What is going on in this girls head? I just wanted to tell the girls to stop teasing her, she is going to snap. I simply had that feeling that something could go horribly wrong.

Carrie is not necessarily a girl that you really fear, until the end that it is. She is the character you feel sorry for. I don’t think that in Carroll’s definition of a monster, Carrie would necessarily fit, but there are instances where you definitely fear her and are a bit disgusted. For instance, at her prom when the pig blood is poured onto to her and it is dripping down her face and body, I must admit it seemed a bit monstrous looking to me. It was disgusting, but at the same time it was unnerving. At this point you still feel bad for her and then she snaps. I honestly was just waiting for something bad to happen. You have that feeling that something is going to go extremely wrong here. By now she is aware of her “magical” powers if you will. She has the ability to move objects. Her mother refers to them as devil powers, bringing a bit of the supernatural into this film. She then basically kills everybody at prom.

The part that I found to be the most horrifying was the end, in which the girl that felt bad for the way she had treated Carrie, Sue, seemed to be sick from shock. In her dreams she is bringing flowers to Carrie’s house and all of a sudden Carrie’s bloody arm comes out and grabs her. This was definitely not expected considering the house had fallen on Carrie and her mother. It created that startle effect as well as a bit of what Schneider discussed with built up suspense followed by a sudden surprise. In a sense, this whole movie is suspense with a sudden surprise. From the beginning you just get this feeling something is not right and then comes prom.

This film is a prime example of a postmodern horror film. This is definitely more of a pessimistic film. Good does not conquer evil; she kills everybody, even the people that were nice to her. It doesn’t seem as though one person is left alive except for Sue (who had her boyfriend, Tommy, take Carrie to the prom because she felt bad for teasing her; when Sue showed up at prom, the gym teacher thought she was up to something and escorted her out). There really is no closure in this film and you are left to wonder whether she is dead or alive. You are not reassured that she is in fact dead, as in lifeless. She does have powers.

In a lot of ways this does have relevance in today’s society. While the powers I don’t feel to be realistic or plausible, the idea behind this film is not completely implausible. I don’t want to really get into this topic too far, but there are instances such as Columbine, or even the more recent Virginia tech incident. While it is not necessarily realistic in the way that Carrie did this, I do think that this has a natural or real horror mix to this as well. There is this fear.