# Carnival of Souls

Carnival of Souls is a 1962 film about a woman becomes drawn to a mysterious abandoned carnival after a traumatic accident.
    Directed by Herk Harvey. Written by John Clifford and Herk Harvey.

## Mary Henry

* I don't belong in the world-that's what it is. Something separates me from other people.
* It's funny... the world is so different in the daylight. In the dark, your fantasies get so out of hand. But in the daylight everything falls back into place again.
* [yelling into the void] WHY CAN'T ANYBODY HEAR ME?
* They're everywhere, they're everywhere. They're not going to let me go. Everywhere I turn, there's something blocking my escape. It's trying to prevent me from living. He's trying to take me back somewhere. I can't fight anymore... I, I don't know what's real anymore.

## Other

* Minister: Profane! Sacrilege! What are you playing in this church? Have you no respect? Do you feel no reverence? Then I feel sorry for you... and your lack of soul.

## Dialogue

    Organ Factory Boss: Good luck, Mary. Stop by and see us the next time you're in.
    Mary Henry: Thank you... but I'm never coming back.
    Organ Factory Boss: Day before yesterday she was the only one of three girls to survive an accident. You'd think she'd feel a little something...like humbleness or gratitude.
    Organ Factory Worker: Never know what she thinks. She's always kept pretty much to herself.
    Organ Factory Boss: Yeah, maybe in her place I'd do the same thing. Just pick up life again.
    Organ Factory Worker: Well, she's so quiet-like she fools you. But she's a tough-minded little thing.
    Organ Factory Boss: I guess that's what it takes to survive. I still say she's behaving strangely.
    Organ Factory Worker: Well, if she's got a problem, it'll go right along with her.
    Organ Factory Boss: Yep.
    Minister: [about the abandoned carnival] This used to be quite a place. It's been deserted for a long time now.
    Mary Henry: Will you take me in?
    Minister: Goodness no. It isn't safe out there anymore. That's why they put up this barrier.
    Mary Henry: It'd be very easy to step around it.
    Minister: What attraction could there be for you... out there?
    Mary Henry: I'm not sure. I'm a reasonable person  I don't know. Maybe I want to satisfy myself that the place isn't any more than it appears to be. Would you take me out there?
    Minister: No. The law has placed it off-limits. It wouldn't be very seemly for a minister to break the law, would it?
    Mary Henry: No. Maybe I can come back some other time.
    Mary Henry: Who's the man in the hall?
    Mrs. Thomas: Oh, you must mean Mr. Linden. He has the room across the hall.
    Mary Henry: No, I mean the other one.
    Mrs. Thomas: There is no other. Me and you and Mr. Linden... us there is all there is in this house.
    Mary Henry: But you must have passed him out there.
    Mrs. Thomas: You're needing this food. Going without eating makes you jumpy sometimes. Maybe you heard the boards pop or something. These old houses creak worse than my knees.
    Mary Henry: I didn't hear him, Mrs. Thomas  I saw him.
    Mrs. Thomas: Now don't talk that way. I don't sleep so good as it is. It's these old houses. They, they're big enough so that you could hide a man in every corner. You just gotta not let your imagination run away with you.
    John Linden: Hey, look, I got a couple shots left over from last night, you want a little bit in yours?
    Mary Henry: No thanks. It's not the recommended breakfast for a church organist.
    John Linden: Oh, is that what you do? Hey, you mean they, they pay somebody to play the organ in church?
    Mary Henry: Some churches do.
    John Linden: Hey, I hope you don't mind about this, I just didn't know you were a church woman.
    Mary Henry: To me a church is just a place of business.
    John Linden: That's a funny way to look at it.
    Mary Henry: Why? People seem shocked because I took a job in a church and I regard it simply as a job. I'm a professional organist and I play for pay, that's all.
    John Linden: Talking like that, don't that get you nightmares?
    John Linden: [pours whiskey in his morning coffee] What do you think, I'm an alcoholic? I just like to start the day off in a good mood.
    Mary Henry: You must be hilarious by noon.
    John Linden: [when Mary does not drink the glass of beer he ordered for her at a bar] What's the matter? Don't you drink?
    Mary Henry: Not really.
    John Linden: Well, I do. And not only do I drink really, I really drink.
    Mary Henry: I'm a competent person. If anything, I'm a realist. I'm not given to imagining anything.
    Dr. Samuels: Hogwash. All of us imagine things. Have you never heard two men talking behind your back and imagined they were talking about you? Have you never imagined you saw someone you knew and walked up to them and found they were a perfect stranger.
    Mary Henry: I don't see what this has to do with it.
    Dr. Samuels: The point is this. Our imaginations play tricks on us. They often misinterpret what we see and hear.
    John Linden: That's just what I need, get mixed up with a girl who's off her rocker.
    Mary Henry: I DON'T WANT TO BE LEFT ALONE!

## Taglines

* She Escaped Death. Now It Wants Her Back!
* She Was A Stranger Among The Living.
* A story so unusual it will burn itself into your mind
* A weird tale of the unnatural
* A picture that will haunt you

## Cast

* Candace Hilligoss — Mary Henry
* Frances Feist — Mrs. Thomas
* Sidney Berger — John Linden
* Art Ellison — Minister
* Stan Levitt - Dr. Samuels

## External links

* Carnival of Souls quotes at the Internet Movie Database
* Carnival of Souls at Rotten Tomatoes