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| Sissy Spacek's transformation from prom queen to avenging angel in Brian De Palma's Carrie |
QUICK REVIEW:
Carrie is a young girl with a loony-religious mother. She gets bullied in high school in the crudest ways, and at the prom, she loses control of her telekinetic powers.
Brian De Palma (Obsession (1976)) elbows himself into the American 'big league' with Carrie and shows his visual masterfulness very clearly here. The film is packed with neat and innovative camera-work, (by cinematographer Mario Tosi (Resurrection (1980)).
Carrie is an exceptional youth horror classic, - and a film with some fine women in the leads: Sissy Spacek (The Straight Story (1999)) is a marvel as the fragile, eerily gifted Carrie, Piper Laurie (The Hustler (1961)) is memorable as her zealous mother, (they were both Oscar-nominated for their performances), and Bette Buckley (The Happening (2008)) is sympathetic as the nice gym teacher.
Pino Donaggio's (Passion (2012)) score is co-responsible for the overwhelmingly operatic quality that radiates from Carrie's 2nd half.
Before the finalizing shock (SPOILER with Carrie's hand), De Palma has fired up a tragedy of Biblical proportions, especially with SPOILER the death of the mother. The only slight disappointment with Carrie is to find that behind all the powerful uses of multifarious effects which are at work in it, no real statement or faith rests, besides the belief in these strong scenes. These, however, can't be taken away from De Palma or the film.
Carrie was Stephen King's bestselling first novel and the first to be adapted, (now his writings have resulted in more than 100 films and TV-productions.) The rights were bought for just 2,500 $, and King was thrilled with the finished movie.
The trailer wrongly announced that Carrie sees John Travolta in his first feature role, which is untrue, because he also stars in the phenomenally strange The Devil Rain (1975), in which SPOILER he melts!
De Palma is getting old, but he's still active, with two movies optioned; the Émile Zola-adaptation Therese Raquin and a film called Happy Valley. The same goes for Spacek, who will star in an untitled KZK/Sony TV-series, debuting next year.
Related review:
Brian De Palma: Carlito's Way (1993) - De Palma's best gangster movie
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| Piper Laurie made a comeback as Carries mother, having been out of film and TV since the mid-sixties, in Brian de Palma's Carrie |
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| Puberty and getting your period for the first time has rarely been scarier than it is for Sissy Spacek's character in Brian De Palma's Carrie |
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| Brian De Palma's Carrie involves a delicious sense of evil that we almost partake in, because we know what will happen to poor Carrie, whereupon most audiences will relish her revenge |
Watch the original trailer here
Cost: 1.8 mil. $
Box office: 33.8 mil. $
= Huge hit
What do you think of Carrie?
Seen the sequel and/or the TV or feature remake?
If so, sum them up, please
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