Carrie (1976)
Directed by Brian De Palma
Withdrawn and sensitive teenager Carrie White faces bullying from her classmates and abuse from her fanatically pious mother. When she begins to suspect that she has supernatural powers, things take a dark and violent turn.
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6 films that influenced Carrie
What critics say influenced Carrie
Nor does Carrie enlist our sympathies through the portrayal of maternal self-sacrifice for the benefit of a beloved daughter in the style of Stella Dallas (King Vidor, 1937) or Mildred Pierce (Michael Curtiz, 1945).
Although it does not altogether exclude men from the screen, in the manner of George Cukor’s The Women (1939), it portrays a world from which men are either absent (Carrie’s [Sissy Spacek] father abandoned his family, Sue Snell’s [Amy Irving] father is never mentioned), or relegated to the periphery as awkward headmasters and ineffectual boyfriends, manipulated by the women.
Nor does Carrie enlist our sympathies through the portrayal of maternal self-sacrifice for the benefit of a beloved daughter in the style of Stella Dallas (King Vidor, 1937) or Mildred Pierce (Michael Curtiz, 1945).
Carrie is almost an amalgamation of The Exorcist and American Graffiti, with Spacek as a religious maniac's daughter whose experience of puberty is so harrowing that it develops paranormal aspects.
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His earlier films were little seen and his rock ‘n’ roll horror comedy Phantom of the Paradise (1974) had never gone beyond cult status.
Half Phantom of the Paradise , half Obsession , Carrie is hysterical in every sense of the word.
This first unsettling psychological thriller was followed by Phantom of the Paradise (1974) and Obsession (1976).
Spacek, who had worked for De Palma before as a set dresser on Phantom of the Paradise, was now a star, and was nominated for her first Best Actress Oscar.
Sissy Spacek reportedly worked as a set dresser, which helped lead to her role as Carrie two years later.
Carrie is his masterpiece, but he has made many other great movies; Sisters (1973), The Fury (1978), Dressed to Kill (1980), Blow Out (1981), Scarface (1983), and Casualties of War (1989) -- an exception to the rule, a dynamic message movie.
At the time, its way of wringing thrills from genre conventions at the same time it mocked them seemed imaginative and original; but in the light of Carrie, Obsession, and The Fury, it's more like a dead end--the mark of a superficial stylist unable to take anything seriously, including his own work.
Missing is the Carrie -esque jump-scare ending employed in so many of the director’s more widely known films.