Carrie

Plot synopsis:
Several people are being interviewed in a police station, including a high school student, Sue Snell (Kandyse McClure) and gym teacher Miss Desjarden (Rena Sofer). Detective John Mulcahey (David Keith) is investigating the disappearance of high school student Carrie White (Angela Bettis). These interviews are interspersed with flashbacks to previous events.
The film then features a flashback of two weeks before the prom at Ewen High School. Carrie is a shy and withdrawn girl tormented by the popular girls; Christine "Chris" Hargensen (Emilie De Ravin) and Tina Blake (Katharine Isabelle) are especially vicious. After gym class, Carrie has her first period in the shower, and she panics. The other girls swarm the shower and taunt her. Hearing the commotion, Ms. Desjarden comes into the shower, and comforts Carrie as a light bulb shatters above them. Later, Principal Morton (Laurie Murdoch) decides to send Carrie home, but calls Carrie the wrong name (he calls her "Cassie", instead of "Carrie.") Carrie corrects him repeatedly, finally yelling as his desk suddenly moves several inches. As Carrie gathers her belongings to leave, she is the victim of a practical joke at her locker, where the words "plug it up" are written on her locker door and when she opens the door, tampons fall out and onto the floor. On her way home, Carrie is accosted by a boy on a bicycle, whose joke goes wrong when he seemingly flies off his bike and crashes into a tree. When she reaches home, Carrie has a flashback to her own childhood before entering the house. Carrie's fanatically religious mother, Margaret White (Patricia Clarkson), who considers menstruation a sign of sexual sin, locks Carrie in her "prayer closet" as punishment.
The next day, Ms. Desjarden gives the girls a week's detention for their bullying. If they skip the detention, they face suspension and refusal of their prom tickets. Chris storms out in protest. After Chris' father John Hargensen, a lawyer, unsuccessfully attempts to get her prom ban rescinded, Chris enlists her boyfriend Billy Nolan to get revenge on Carrie. Meanwhile, Carrie discovers she has telekinesis, the ability to move or control objects with her mind. Carrie has a telekinetic episode in class and, when she goes home, practices her rediscovered talent. Sue, trying to atone for tormenting Carrie, asks her boyfriend, Tommy Ross (Tobias Mehler), to take Carrie to the prom. After some hesitation, Carrie agrees. When Carrie tells her mother about the prom invitation, Margaret forbids her to go; Carrie uses her powers to finally confront her mother, and Margaret seemingly gives in.
As prom night approaches, Chris and Billy prepare their revenge on Carrie when they find out that Carrie is on the Prom Queen ballot. On the day of the prom, Tina switches the ballots, and Carrie and Tommy are declared the Prom King and Queen winners. As Tommy and Carrie take their place onstage, Chris, who has been hiding with Billy in the rafters, pulls a rope to tip a bucket, sending a wave of blood onto Carrie. Chris and Billy run; when Chris releases the rope, the bucket falls on Tommy's head, knocking him out. Carrie goes into a shock-induced trance and telekinetic mayhem ensues. She locks everyone inside the gym and sets fire to it. She kills Tina by crushing her, and then electrocutes most of the remaining students, including Roy and Helen, killing everyone except for a few students, including Norma, who escape through a vent with Ms. Desjarden. Carrie then leaves the burning gym, unleashing a wave of destruction in the entire town. Chris and Billy see her walking in the road. Billy tries to run her down but Carrie tosses their truck into a pole, thus killing them.
When Carrie arrives home, she gets into a bathtub, where she finally snaps back to herself but cannot remember what happened. Margaret comes into the bathroom and calls her a witch for destroying the whole town; she then drowns Carrie in the tub. With her last ounce of strength Carrie stops her mother's heart. Sue finds Carrie near death and manages to revive Carrie with artificial respiration. At Sue's suggestion, Carrie fakes her death and Sue sneaks Carrie out of town to Florida. As the two drive off, Carrie has a nightmarish vision of her mother. When Carrie wakes, she looks at Sue and hallucinates Chris lunging at her. Noticing this, Sue asks her if she wants to stop for a moment, but Carrie tells her to keep driving.

Tags: paranormal, revenge, gothic, prank

Review:
For some strange reason, during the prom scene where the blood is poured on Carrie, I was actually waiting to hear the famous line, "They're all gonna laugh at you!"  That was such a nice touch in the original, but very difficult to duplicate.
Overall this movie was enjoyable to watch and to see a classic book and film come back.
It seems to make as much sense to remake a great movie like Brian DePalma's 1976 horror/suspense masterpiece CARRIE for television as it did to make a sequel of it in the form of THE RAGE: CARRIE 2 three years before, but that's what has been done.
A lot of bells and whistles have been added to this television remake, but in the end this CARRIE is still in the shadow of the DePalma original.Angela Bettis (GIRL INTERRUPTED) has the unenviable task of stepping into the shoes (and the prom dress) of Sissy Spacek in the title role of a New England teen tortured at school by cruel classmates (because she doesn't belong) and at home by her religiously fanatical mother (Patricia Clarkson, in the Piper Laurie role).
Soon, she discovers she has telekinetic powers; and when the most gruesome of gags is played on her on prom night, all bets are off.Though looking much more glazed in the eyes than Spacek ever did, Bettis gives a fairly good performance as Carrie; and Clarkson's portrayal of her uprighteous mother is much more low-key, but no less threatening, than Laurie's portrayal.
Because of DePalma's use of slow-motion in the original, the blood hits Spacek like a tidal wave.I give the CARRIE remake a '6' just for trying.
To state that this new version of Carrie doesn't remotely compare with the original horror classic is to belabor the obvious, so I will leave that issue aside.However, I expected this movie to be simply garbage, like the recent "Rose Red", or dull and mediocre, like the TV remake of The Shining, and surprisingly, it was better than that.Making a remake of a classic film is usually inadvisable, but under the circumstances, this was an honest and decent rendition of Carrie.
Still, if you can ignore that....Overall I really enjoyed this telemovie and would recommend it to anyone who wants a bit of a scare and to be entertained, and notI'll probably be burned at the stake for this too, but I preferred Angela Bettis charactisation of Carrie to Sissy Spaceks in the original..
All in all I thought the remake of Carrie wasn't as classic as the original, but was more according to the book and they picked the characters well.
I like that it has more dimensions than Brian Deplama's characterization of Carrie's mom in the original film.Rena Sofer (TV's ED) is also very good as Carrie's tough as nails gym teacher, one of Carrie's only supporters.
The only horror and the terrible thing is that I've spent more then 2 hours on this crap.I saw that there is going to be "Carrie" on TV so I was happy to see one great movie again.I didn't read what version of "Carrie" this was and that was my mistake.But what a hell I decided to take a look.That was my second mistake.Truly stupid and poor try to be better then the original.How did they even come up with that thought of making this movie?With what?Actors,director?Actors-who are they?They are not good and Angela Bettis irritates me.Nothing,I assure you nothing to be seen in this one.Only stupid b-TV movie.1/10.
The original "Carrie" will forever remain one of the greatest horror films of all time, possessing two phenomenal performances and a talented director at the apex of his career, combining the stylistic flourishes of Hitchcock and Argento with amazing results.
Yet expanding on the original might not sound like such a bad idea, particularly taking into account that the sequence, present in the novel, where Carrie destroys the whole town could not be filmed by De Palma for budgetary reasons.
"Carrie" is not a terrible remake, but it isn't a particularly good one either, so unless you're a Bettis fan just rent the original again or even the sequel, which isn't looking all that bad right about now..
This was the question facing the 2002 television version of "Carrie" and is the question currently facing the brand new, Chloe Moretz-starring remake.So, do the performances justify the film?
It's a very good performance from a great actress.Patricia Clarkson also goes in a very different direction from what Piper Laurie did in the original.
Carrie still gets her period in the girl's changing room, freaks out, discovers her powers, faces her religious fanatic mother, gets invited to the prom by Tommy Ross, has pig's blood dumped on her, goes nuts and kills a lot of people.
If you've read the book, you know that Carrie isn't as cute as in the 70's version, her mother is way more crazy ...
The actress delivers the character of Carrie superb, and sometimes better than Sissy Spacek (I am going to get so much sh*t from "real" horror fans for saying that).
It's inevitable to think of Brian DePalma's original scarefest with the Oscar nominated Sissy Spacek and Piper Laurie; but if we take this made for TV movie on its own merits and try not to compare it, we may find it's a pretty good movie.
The production values for a TV movie are very good, even if some of the CGI effects look a little forced, but director David Carson gives us the portrait of a lonely girl who just wants to fit in, and whose retaliation on a sad bunch of spoiled brats is carried to the extreme.
Patricia Clarkson's understated performance as Margaret White is just as chilling as the over the top fanaticism of Piper Laurie; Tobias Mehler is a likable and hunky Tommy; Rena Sofer brings a lot of punch to her role as the gym teacher; Katherine Isabelle (Ginger Snaps) is a bitchy Tina, and the young lady who plays Chris (didn't catch her name, but she's currently on the hit series LOST) is also effectively sinister.
Like "Dawn of the Dead", the original "Carrie" story is so good that generally faithful remakes like this are still entertaining even if they are not equal to the original De Palma film.
But most 2002 viewers watched this thing on 19-inch standard definition televisions where these differences are barely detectable.Both the original and the remake stay "generally" faithful to the Stephen King novel so long-time fans will have little to cringe about.
On the minus side, the original ending is altered (extended) in a totally contrived way to keep things open for a future television series (maybe Carrie finds her "Tru Calling") for which the producers ultimately could not find adequate financing.Angela Bettis' "Carrie" is virtually identical to the Sissy Spacek version.
This is no surprise since Laurie's performance was the best thing about the original but Clarkson's repressed version of the character takes away from the sympathy factor Bettis is going for.
The dialogue is almost exactly the same, except for a few added and deleted scenes.Bettis does a nice job as Carrie; that was the only thing that surprised me about this movie.
As for the sports teacher, she was the worst of the lot and would probably be more at home on the set of 'Baywatch'.This is a weak, boring film with a happier ending than the original, of which left me open-mouth with shock, sadness and wonder...this versions nice ending left me feeling a bit p***ed off and angry that I had wasted my time watching it.
The special FX are weak, the characterizations cold, and the whole movie is quite inferior.The only real highlights come from star Angela Bettis (who was so good in the film May 2003) and supporting actors David Keith and Rena Sofer.Definitely one of the lesser horror remakes of late.* 1/2 out of ****.
Also this Carrie, as scenes in it that are not in the original, but in the book, as well as making the death of the mother less symbolic, and more what Stephen King himself wrote.
One of the things about this movie that made me feel bad was that Carrie (Angela Bettis) got picked on.
For those who can't handle reading the book, at least see the original movie to find out how horror was (and should always be) created on film when there were competent directors in Hollywood..
Not meteors.MUCH of the dialogue in this movie, during crucial scenes makes you feel Deja Vu; lines that were lifted from the book are understandable, but much of it just feels like you're watching a modernized version of the movie, most notably during Miss Desjardin's speaking to the girls about whether or not "any of them ever stop to think?"   The bit about the color of Carrie's prom dress ("I might've known it would be red") in the original movie was a mistake, where the dress used was pink, and the script called for red.
This happens lots of times throughout the movie.During the prom scene, Carrie misunderstands much of the slang and jargon of 2002, because she's sheltered, which worked nicely, only I don't think it was handled properly.
Her initial telepathic acts seem almost like she KNEW she was making them, and making them out of anger, rather than the frustration I think she would've felt.I did enjoy the nonchalance with Margaret White (Patricia Clarkson) assaults her daughter, but for the most part she just came off to me as generally very weak and that made Carrie feeling threatened by her harder to swallow.Emilie de Ravin was cast as Chris Hargensen because Julia Stiles either wasn't available or knew better than to take the role.
However, I think she did the best she could under the circumstances, and I liked the exchange between Miss Desjardin, Principle Morton, and Mr. Hargensen.The special effects during the prom scene are good, and the "delay" on the climax was cute, but everything else felt like a waste of time -- not to mention the movie's 180 minute running time.
There were better ways to go about the ending..in fact, Stephen King, if you've heard of him, wrote a great one in the book this movie is based on.So, two stars out of five, I guess.
Angela Bettis gives an off-putting titular performance that plays more like a parade of acting tics than a character, while Patricia Clarkson conversely underplays her role as Carrie's mother and neutralizes the character's menace in the process.
I already know the story of Carrie, but I'm really surprised how much I enjoyed this remake of the horror '76 classic.
The movie has a good editing, camera-work and special effects, but the only problem is that Angela Bettis was too much old for the role.
There are few remakes that are better than the original.Now to remake a King it has to be a reason.The original CARRIE was a new brand of horror,but it didn't have everything from the book,which you would except,yet it's still was good.Now this is what a Stephen King fan was waiting for....CARRIE.This is the book, but a live action pop up version.
Angela Bettis turn as CARRIE was amazing and brilliant,she also looked beautiful.Patrica Clarkson turn as the mother was more sick and abusive than Piper Laurie.Rena Sofer took the role of Sue and made it her own.Both her and Amy Irving played Sue good in each version.Kandyse McClure made Miss Collins a badass and I loved it.And she kinda looks like Demi Moore.Emilie de Ravin made Chris more of a bitch than evil.Katharine Isabelle played Norma a bitch and look like one,but a hot one at that.Tobias Mehler didn't have the sex appeal as John Travolta have,but made Billy's role more creepy and bad boyish,just like in the book.David Keith might be new to the film,not in the book,and made the film more interesting,like the book.
If you prefer a true adaptation and like reality TV, this here, the 2002 version of Carrie by David Carson might be the better one for you.In the end I wish that some of the production costs squandered on this unnecessary remake would have been used to realize something new and original..
Brian De Palma's "Carrie" was a good yet often emotionally icy adaptation of Stephen King's novel of high school hell (and too often surrendered itself to style over substance, from the obnoxiously 'symbolic' kitchen-utensil crucifixion of Piper Laurie to the long tracking shots of the rope attached to the bucket of pig's blood, etc.); in 1999, a sequel (but really just a thinly disguised remake in and of itself) was released, that updated the situations and characters to a self-absorbed teen culture, with its emphasis on style and discrimination.
She is very good at playing misfits who are sweet, innocent and DEADLY!!!And I'd heard a lot of people criticize this TV remake of the Sissy Spacek film.
This longer version is more true to the original intent of the story for many reasons; one of the most important is by having the kids portrayed by teenage actors.And you get a much more complex perspective of the mother and the relationship between Carrie and Margaret.
Rena Sofer's gym teacher fares better as the sympathetic gym teacher, but Kandyse McClure's "Sue Snell" (Carrie's fellow student who farms her boyfriend out for a prom date) has a mysterious agenda throughout the movie (which is told as a flashback), missing out on DePalma's luminous Amy Irving, whose shame, guilt and compassion fueled the sad tale.
I really liked this film,the prom scene was awesome,the effects were really really bad but it's a TV movie so that's reasonable.
NBC's "CARRIE" remake was a pretty good modernization of the Stephen King story.
Over all this film certainly isn't the original, but it is worth watching for the next generation of "CARRIE" fans..
I'm sure that Stephen  King's book didn't deal with interracial relationships in high school, and not that it isn't ok, but I don't think that adding politically correctness to this "movie" afterwards adds anything at all to the original's message.
For me, Piper Laurie was the ultimate Mrs. White, and I don't care how many times this movie is remade, she gets my vote, hands down.One more note -- this Carrie didn't win any sympathy votes with me, but Sissy Spacek sure did.See the original, and forget that this one was ever made..
The original version of Carrie was a great movie.
Carrie does stuff that NEVER happens in the book or the original movie.
I know ALOT of people are going to hate this movie, but give it a chance, because it really is worth at least a look.The original Carrie is a classic but it is dated and I thought this Carrie was more in the "now" which I liked very much!It was more faithful to the book and another thing that I thought was better about this one was the bullies who picked on Carrie.
Most of this played out like a first dress rehearsal for a high school play, and to call it "wooden" would only insult a fine building material with things this production sadly lacked: texture, strength, beauty, etc.Apparently the amateurs who put this together could think of nothing better than to follow the original script with lesser performances, add a few computer-aided crash scenes, and then come up with the stupidest ending one could imagine.
Ed. teacher Rita Desjarden, Kandyse McClure re-invented a colored version of Amy Irving's original Sue Snell character and Angela Bettis, though she is no Sissy Spacek, brought a very unique version of the Carrie White character to life.
What sets this version apart,and in some ways makes it better than the original 1976 movie,is it's presentation.
(Only Nolan and his pack of idiots, who didn't know what the pigs blood was for, were in on it.) Angela Bettis who played "Carrie" looked like she was having an epileptic fit half the time.
I had not read the original novel by Stephen King and was told that the movie would appeal to me more if only I took the time to read the book.
I feel that there is no better Carrie than Sissy Spacek, and if a director really needs money, then please remake a bad movie.
The biggest being that even the DePalma film left out a lot of stuff from the book so I looked forward to this remake to see what they did but nothing done here can equal the original and to make matters worse we get a new ending here, which is just downright horrid.
The acting wasn't as good as it was in the original, the story is tweaked in ways that hurt this movie not help it, and it feels like a "Made for T.V" movie at times.4/10.
Having seen the 76 version and being a bit disappointed, I was curious to see what this was like.The movie is completely faithful to the book and all the better for it....with the exception of the very end which looks like it was intended to promote a spin off series.I can only recommend that people see it, I know there is another remake due in 2013, but that looks like it is financially driven in terms of making good box office returns.
Carrie's mother's death was more elaborate in the original Plus the prom scene was better too.
The only thing i give it a FAIR rating is because Angela Bettis plays Carrie very well, she performs almost like Sissy Spacek did.
I was half-way through the movie, when I realized that it was, subtly, better.I also did not want to like Angela Bettis as Carrie White.
Maybe because I read the book before I saw the original, but this feels more like an expansion of the 76 film than a remake.