If you thought your high school years were a horror wait until you see this film. Stephen King’s novel Carrie found its’ way to Hollywood royalty status when Brian De Palma worked it into a film that has, as an article by publication Cinephilia & Beyond stated, “aged like the best French Wine”. It goes on to say “Four decades later, standing out as one of the most capably crafted horror films of all time”. I can agree with this statement as I don’t believe there has been very many films with the kind of success and recognition in pop culture like this one. The film tackles numerous subjects such as teen peer pressure, high school horror stories, mental illness, bible-abuse and so much more. 

Carrie takes place in a small rural town in Maine. The first scene starts off in a girls’ high school locker room where the director was not shy on displaying nude scenes in the opener. The music plays soft happy 70s film score as there is a slow-motion montage of girls getting ready and Carrie in the shower. Soon we see blood run down her leg and the music stops. Suddenly we see her running to the other girls in terror in the locker room with blood on her hands as if she thinks she’s dying. The girls begin taunting her, throwing tampons at the young startled girl before Miss Collins, a seemingly caring teacher, runs to her to comfort her. In this first scene it becomes evident that Carrie is not only an outsider but also that she has telekinetic powers when she screams and a lamp bursts above her. 

She is sent home for the day where we get to see a glimpse of Carrie’s home life which is less than perfect. A home without a father and no one to turn to but a crazed religious-nut mother who uses the bible as a weapon to mentally, verbally and physically abuse her daughter. With lines like “Pimples are the Lord’s way of chastising you”, calling her daughter a sinner because she had her first period, telling Carrie she should have killed herself when her father had intercourse with her and locking Carrie into a closet after making her recite a bible verse shows what kind of abuse and torment the young girl had to face. 

If that doesn’t make things worse, we cut back to her life at school where a group of kids decide to play a trick on Carrie after being punished by Miss Collins. Mean girl, Chris Hargensen (Nancy Allen) and Billy Nolan (John Travolta) play the main villains in the film where they are shown slaughtering a pig and ultimately in one of horror film history’s most memorable scenes, dumps a bucket of pigs’ blood on top of Carrie at her high school prom when she is falsely voted as the prom queen. Cutting to the chase, this is at long last the final straw for Carrie and her days of being bullied. She uses her telekinesis to wreak havoc on all of her schoolmates ending the lives of every student and teacher including the innocent bystanders. As Carrie arrives home she comes to the realization of what she’s done and in a final scene of tragedy is met with the dark fate of using her powers to kill her mother when she is attacked with a knife by the only person she was maliciously raised by. 

While watching the film, I couldn’t help but think about how the film is so masterfully crafted tackling so many topics that by today’s standards would wishfully be talking points of the past but unfortunately have not gone away completely. In an article by Peter Sobczynski, he says of the film: What makes “Carrie” especially compelling to watch today, more so than many other horror films from the era when it first came out, is that the thematic issues are just as relevant today as they were in 1976, if not more so. The film does seem to raise awareness for all the injustices that we aim to fight today such as child abuse, bullying and acts of violence. Carrie is not only a brilliant film because of the way they carefully crafted each scene visually around the storyline but because the visuals and storyline work together to bring about an awareness of the most vile side of human behavior which is something that we all can learn from as a way to stand up to and protect the innocent from the bullying and abuses that happen in our communities.