Carrie

Only in the 70’s and in the 80’s could you get away with showing high school girls naked in the shower. John Hughes did it in Sixteen Candles with Jake Ryan’s girlfriend, Brian De Palma did it in the original Carrie with Sissy Spacek, and I’m sure Roman Polanski wanted to try it but he was eventually run out of the country when he was having um…tryouts! I looked it up and Spacek was actually 26 years old when they filmed Carrie, so it wasn’t all that bad; but man she looked really young back then. She’s always looked like the skeleton from Tales from the Crypt to me but I have to admit that she was a little bit better looking then than I originally thought. Well, thankfully in the re imagination of Carrie, the director Kimberly Peirce decides to forgo the nudity that existed in the infamous opening shower scene.  Chloe Grace Moretz is an awesome actress and you can tell that she is going to be a drop dead knockout when she’s of age but there’s no need to go fishing for local sex offenders in the theater, I just want my horror with gore and age appropriate nudity please! But enough of that as simply typing this is creeping me out a bit.

I was however worried about the fact that Moretz is such an attractive person; so much so that I thought it might negatively affect the story. I thought it would be more like that awfully awesome movie She’s All That, where it just seemed so ridiculous to me that no one would think Rachel Leigh Cook was cute or dateable simply because she wore glasses.  I mean, high school dudes try and dry hump trees when those hormones finally kick in, let alone someone that looks like Cook! Well Moretz is able to properly display the sense of isolation and social awkwardness of Carrie on screen, so this makes the fact that everyone treats her like a freak a bit more believable than if they had simply cast someone who was only pretty to play this role (see every horror movie ever made).

The movie opens up as all horror movies should; with a shot of an old house that has loud screaming coming out of it, followed by a blood covered bed. In this scene you see the actual birth of Carrie and you get a full sense of just how crazy her mother is. Ms. White is played by Julianne Moore and it seems like she was born for this role. She is wonderful in everything she does and the fact that she’s a natural redhead can’t help but be a plus because everyone knows that redheads are crazy!!! You could tell that she thoroughly enjoyed playing the religiously misguided and overbearing mother of Carrie who punishes herself on a regular basis for her sins. Did I still want to have sex with her? Well yeah, but I can see how having her as a mother would lead to a complete lack of social skills for her unfortunate offspring.

Speaking of, after Carrie has an unbelievably embarrassing incident at school, which of course gets posted online for the entire world to see, her gym teacher and the principal decide to discipline those that were involved. This in turn leads to the evil Chris and her boyfriend to go out and try seek revenge for the punishment that was handed down, and if you have seen the original then you know that the results are both deadly and horrific!

What makes this movie work is the excellent casting job by the director. It’s refreshing to see a horror movie that has good actors in it. There were a couple of moments at the end that could have come off as cheesy or laughable but because Moretz was so in tune with the character and the built up rage and frustration that eventually bubbles up, you catch yourself cheering for her while at the same time finding yet another reason to be afraid of a 15 year old girl. They found a way to add their own elements to the story without losing the overall tone of the original. The subtle plot changes they made actually enhanced the story and added to the elements of compassion, creepiness, and yes even the gore that was a part of this film.

 In spite of the highly questionable final shot of the movie, I absolutely loved it and will give it a rating of FRESH! But I just want to put up this caution flag for the director Peirce; if you look at Brian De Palma and the  movies he made after Carrie, he had some classics in Scarface, Carlito’s Way, and the Untouchables. But the second he teamed up with Nic Cage in Snake Eyes he immediately went down hill and became Brian D’s in My Palma! As fresh as the Cage is, stay far far away! Please!!!