Carrie (1976)

Carrie
Directed by Brian De Palma
Written by Lawrence G. Cohen from a novel by Stephen King
1976/US
IMDb page
First viewing/Amazon Prime rental
One of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die

Margaret White: Carrie, you haven’t touched your apple cake.
Carrie: It gives me pimples, Mama.
Margaret White: Pimples are the Lord’s way of chastising you.

A movie about humans doing cruel and disgusting things to each other was not for me, no matter how well it was made.

Carrie (Sissy Spacek) is a high school senior.  She is viewed as the class weirdo.  One day in the gym showers she discovers she is bleeding and panics.  It is her much-delayed first menstrual period.  The girls think this is hilarious and taunt her.  As punishment, the gym teacher assigns all the mean girls to detention.  Those that refuse detention will be unable to attend the senior prom.  The meanest of all the girls (Nancy Allen) plans an elaborate revenge on Carrie with her boyfriend (John Travolta).

Carrie has clearly been traumatized by her religious fanatic mother Margaret (Piper Laurie). Now that she is a “woman”, Margaret fears that all the sins and evils of Eve will descend her daughter.  Then one of the girls (Amy Irving in her film debut) talks her boyfriend into taking Carrie to the prom.  Margaret forbids this but Carrie is intent on going and says nothing can stop her.  How true this is!

The prom turns out to be a huge humiliation to Carrie.  Unbeknownst to everyone, Carrie can fight back – and in spectacular fashion.

I generally have a bad reaction to cruelty in movies and my reaction to this one was no exception. I also found some of the script kind of dated and trite. The acting, on the other hand, was phenomenal and the special effects were stunning.

Sissy Spacek was nominated for the Best Actress Oscar; Piper Laurie was nominated for Best Supporting Actress