Carrie, the new one (spoilers)

[NoClueBoy]

It's been a long time since I read the book or saw the Sissy Spacek version, but WOW. I liked this.

It kind of drug on in spots, but this modern retelling was intriquing, to say the least.

Any one else? Like or dislike...

[Freudian Slit]

Sorry I didn't see it (read the book/seen the old one), but I just thought it was amusing that you used the word "modern retelling." Has Stephen King really gotten that old? I guess it HAS been...well, nearly a quarter of a century since Carrie came out.

[NoClueBoy]

Yeah, 1976 for the movie, '74? the book.

We are getting old.

[MaceMan]

I really liked the new version. It was a very finely executed telling of the story, and the acting was great. The overbearing religious mother, the relentless teasing, the sympathetic characters--all were very believable. I especially liked the ending, as compared to the original movie.

[Spacegirl]

I especially liked the ending, as compared to the original movie.

How did the original one end? Were there any major differences between the new and the old movies?

[t-keela]

The new one didn't end, Carrie just left town w/ everyone kinda wondering what the hell happened.

The original was much better. It (the ending)did in fact startle the shit out of everyone I know that saw it their first time. I remember seeing it at the theatre, everyone in the place jumped, this one was just boring.

Granted there was better effects and character development but the movie itself, NO...sorry to disagree, that's just my opinion.

Peace

[t-keela]

The original ended w/ Carrie's friend standing, then kneeling over her grave.......then suddenly a hand thrusts up through the dirt and grabs her. (totally unexpected the first time you see it & everybody in the place freaked because it looked like the end of the movie)

She begins screaming, REALLY screaming, only to wake up after having had another recurring nightmare. If I remember right she's in the nuthouse as well.

[Spacegirl]

Thanks a bunch! That does sound freaky. Too bad the writers didn't use that for the new one. Maybe they thought it was played out and nobody would be startled?

[Guinastasia]

I liked the new ending-if only because in the original and the book AND the remake-I kept rooting for Carrie, even though I knew what was going to happen to her. She had so much crap to deal with-this was only fair.

Finally, she wins.

[Guinastasia]

Oh-and did anyone else notice that class president was wearing Julia Robert's Oscar dress?

[t-keela]

Originally posted by BluMoon
Thanks a bunch! That does sound freaky. Too bad the writers didn't use that for the new one. Maybe they thought it was played out and nobody would be startled?

No, they tried to play that card by having Carrie "imagine" her mother is standing behind her as she grabs her shoulder, but it comes too late. The timing was off, so it didn't work. At least not for me, especially since Carrie was still alive standing w/ her friend at her (Carrie's)mother and Carrie's fake grave.

Then the two girls drove to Florida where she could start her life over...just didn't work. Unless you like "happy" endings.

[masonite]

Did the new one retain the immortal line "I smelled that cheap roadhouse on his breath and I liked it!" ?

[Max Torque]

Pros:

• Finally, we got to see Carrie's destructive walk home after the prom. I've been waitin' to see that for a long time.

...erm, actually, that's the only "pro" I can think of.

Cons:

• They changed the "plug it up" scene from something that happened then and there into the shower to a prank that happened later, in the hallway. To me, the former seemed more cruel, which made the ultimate demise of the pranksters so much more satisfying.
• The dynamic was different. The original movie gave a better sense of a pack of nasty, manipulative girls who tormented Carrie because they felt they ran the show. This one, not so much.
• The new movie cut way, way back on the fanatic fundamentalism-fueled fury of Carrie's mother. Were they afraid of offending Christians?
• Too many survivors.
• Carrie lived? Carrie's not supposed to live! She's supposed to kill her mother and then pull the house in on herself in a fit of immense guilt!

If we could put the "Carrie walking home" scene in the first movie, then we'd have a version of Carrie I'd truly love.

[heresiarch]

Originally posted by t-keela
Then the two girls drove to Florida where she could start her life over...just didn't work. Unless you like "happy" endings.

I heard that it ended that way because they're going to use this as a pilot for a new TV series. I don't know if that's true -just repeating a rumor.

If so, I doubt I'll be watching it.

I sa about half of it and I thought it was OK, ont great. I wouldn't consider it an improvement over the original.

[Fenris]

What? It wasn't the "Carrie: the Musical" version?


MARGARET:
Oh, how your father whispered in my ear.
First the kiss
And then the touch,
Mixing lies with the truth.
He would sigh and try
To draw me near.
Oh, he'd swear he cared so much.
That's what the boys do.

They'll make promises,
They will break your heart!
Then they'll laugh at you,
Watching you fall apart!
Don't you think that I know,
Don't you think this has happened before?
It's the smell of the blood that will drive them mad,
Chasing you like a whore!


And if they let Carrie live, they ruined it. It's a tragedy for christssake.

Fenris

[Lute Skywatcher]

Originally posted by masonite
Did the new one retain the immortal line "I smelled that cheap roadhouse on his breath and I liked it!" ?

It did but I think the exact wording is "cheap roadhouse whisky".

[AtomicDog]

I kept hoping that Carrie would hit "Xavier's School for Gifted Children" when she did her web search. It would have saved a lot of people a lot of heartache.

[Lute Skywatcher]

I forgot to post this earlier.

A "Carrie" TV series isn't necessarily a bad idea, it could be done like a modern "Incredible Hulk". Have Carrie going from town to town, trying (in vain) to control her powers. She starts out being helpful but something always happens to get her really pissed and then the destruction starts again, then it's off to the next town. Meanwhile, the trail of destruction is followed by Det. Mulcahey or somebody working with him. If done properly, this could be good.

[NoClueBoy]

Kind of like Kolcheck, the Night Stalker?

might work

[Sam Lowry]

Could someone fill me in on what the prank done on Carrie earlier in the movie was?

I started watching the TV movie last night about halfway through maybe, at least after the black girl was her friend and giving her a makeover and the guy asked Carrie to the prom.

It's been a long time since I've seen the orginal Carrie and I couldn't remember what the prank was.

[NoClueBoy]

"Plug it up! Plug it up!"

In this version, they filled her locker with tampons and wrote "Plug it up!" on the outside of it. This was after she freaked out having her period in gym class.

[JustPlainBryan]

Originally posted by AtomicDog
I kept hoping that Carrie would hit "Xavier's School for Gifted Children" when she did her web search. It would have saved a lot of people a lot of heartache.

You know, this is exactly what I thought about a while ago. I contend that Carrie is in fact a mutant!!!!

[NoClueBoy]

Oh, Duh! NOW I get it! Mutant... mutter, mutter, mutter...



________________

sell all your stocks and bonds and invest in iguana leashes - dr. demento

[Kaitlyn]

I didn't like the ending much either. Regardless of the motive, Carrie is a mass murderer (234 people killed, most of them innocent of any wrong-doing toward Carrie). One can make the argument that she was experiencing a period of temporary insanity, a strong one even, but even in that case this isn't a person who should be allowed to walk around free.

I read the book a long time ago, and have the movie on dvd, so I've been familiar with this story for a long time, and I've always found Carrie sympathetic. However, I can't root for her to get away with it. Events of recent years make that position untenable. She was a persecuted loner who snapped under the pressure and killed her classmates in a fit of rage. She then killed an equal or greater number of people for no other reason than that they were in her way. Were it not that the story was written before the events of the past few years, I'd say it was a pretty good metaphor for such occurrences.

BTW, Stephen King pretty much identifies his characters in Carrie, Firestarter, The Shining, etc. as mutants, and even has a fairly consistent system for explaining their abilities. These abilities are sex linked traits; girls tend to get telekenic powers and boys mental abilities. The ability's power is linked to the pituitary gland (somehow) and thus peaks during puberty, which is quite similar to Marvel Universe mutants whose powers tend to manifest at puberty.

I wonder which was first with the mutant abilities linked to puberty thing? When was this explanation first offered in the X-men?

[JustPlainBryan]

Given the recent Carrie events, can we all agree now that mutant registration is necessary?

[NoClueBoy]

posted by Number Six

I wonder which was first with the mutant abilities linked to puberty thing? When was this explanation first offered in the X-men?

mid 70's for both, iirc

[Giraffe]

I thought the remake was horrible. The acting was atrocious, bad-TV-drama acting. The evil teens were implausibly evil, instead of just casually cruel (like real teens). Having her mother try to drown her was stupid. The whole movie dragged until the ending, which was anticlimatic. The computer effects were cheesy -- the whole thing had the production values of an episode of Dawson's Creek.

Granted, I did watch the whole thing. But only because I was playing the Sims at the same time.

[Larry Mudd]

Haven't seen it, but I'm going to offer an opinion anyway. (Don't you love the web?)

The less-direct "Plug it up" is pitiful. The vulnerability and trauma really came through in De Palma's original.

But the "survivor" ending is totally in keeping with the unwritten law of Stephen King adaptations-- principals die in print, walk away happy on celluloid.

You'd think they'd have learned their lesson after remaking The Shining.

Why do they go in for do-overs of the few Stephen King books that were adapted successfully? Wouldn't it make more sense to try and salvage some of the ones that were totally unsatisfactory the first time?

[Naz]

Haven't seen this remake, but it sounds lousy.

You'd think they'd have learned their lesson after remaking The Shining.

Actually, I liked what I saw of that remake. It was truer to the book. I never cared for Kubrick's version.

[sleestak]

I thought it sucked so bad that I didn't even get to the ending. (She lived? WTF?) I haven't watched the original movie in years but the new one still sucked compared to the first version.

Carrie did not come off as near as sypathetic of a character as she did in the book or the original movie. (That is untill she starts killing everyone)

Her Mom was no where near crazy enough in the remake.

The mean girls were too contrived.

Sue Snell's reason for having Tommy take Carrie to the Prom was not flushed out enough.

As someone else said, the bathroom-period scene was no where near as powerful as te original. Though I doubt the original idea would make it onto network TV.

Oh, and the acting sucked.

<hijack>

Does anyone else feel guilty after reading-watching Carrie. Every time I read the story I am reminded of a girl I went through school with until the 8th grade named Nella. Nella was picked on from first grade until 8th by everyone. I participated in this a couple of times. The boys would pick on her then drop it but the girls were merciless. Every time I read or watch Carrie I want to find Nella, call her up and apologize for being such a shit to her for so many years.

</hijack>

Slee

[Guinastasia]

Well, I liked it-if only because the ending was a surprise. I mean, everyone knows Carrie freaked out and such.

But not this time. And I got the feeling she wasn't aware of what she was doing-she was having convulsions, if you noticed, whenever she freaked and caused damage.

Her mother was nowhere near Piper Laurie's terrifying Fundy Rambo, but she was more a creepy, low-key Catholic fundy. I mean, she had crucifixes and such around. That was weird.

I liked seeing Chris and her boyfriend get it. HA!!! As for her killing her mother, this was more true to the book-in the book, she stops her mother's heart.

Well, I guess I'm in the minority.

[Grasshopper]

"Oh-and did anyone else notice that class president was wearing Julia Robert's Oscar dress?"

Yes! I only saw about fifteen minutes of the movie, but I saw part of the prom and I immediately thought of Julia's dress when I saw that girl.

What I saw of the movie was okay, but it was very short so I don't have much of an opinion to offer. I liked Sissy Spacek better than the new Carrie, but for a remake, it didn't seem too bad.

-dippin "I love my life" dots.

[vivalostwages]

It wasn't bad considering how bad some of the made-for-TV-Stephen King adaptations have been, but I much prefer the original for the actors and the overall creepy factor.

[Tristan]

I still haven't seen the ending, it's on the tape at my house, but I do have to say that I was impressed with the shower scene. TV pushed a few boundaries on that one, I'm happy to say.

[Earthworm Jim]

Originally posted by Guinastasia
I got the feeling she wasn't aware of what she was doing-she was having convulsions, if you noticed, whenever she freaked and caused damage.

Oh no They took away any semblance of responsibility the character had for her own actions? Allah be praised I didn't see it.