Carrie (2013) – Review

Where to watch Carrie

3 Stars

I willingly admit that I expected this re-imagining of Brian DePalma’s creepy oddity Carrie to be bottom of the barrel trash, much like the 1999 follow-up Rage:Carrie 2. The new reboot is as good as anyone could have hoped for, its well-made and graced with one of today’s strongest young actress in Chloë Grace Moretz. A onetime Oscar nominee for Boys Don’t Cry, director Kimberly Pierce recruits fellow former Oscar nominee Julianna Moore in addition to a uniformly strong cast of female actors. From the opening moments it is apparent that Pierce has approached her divergent journey into the horror genre with the same thought and care that she lavished on her indie passion projects. This movie feels like it was produced by artist with more than a passing respect for the original but also with the confidence to make this incarnation decidedly sadder.

Carrie is ultimately a highschool revenge fantasy carried to supernatural extremes. In 1976, when the original debuted mass school killings were an unimaginable horror-today its sadly commonplace. The red-haired Carrie is a shy quite girl who just wants to be liked by her peers. One-day during gym class she begins her menstruating and is savagely mocked by the girls in the locker room. This hazing results in disciplinary actions for the girls involved and sets the course for what literally turns out to be a bloodfest.

I can’t praise the casting of Moretz more, she is absolutely spot-on for the role and her depiction is more inviting than the off-putting paring of Sissy Spacek and Piper Lauire thirty five years ago. The ending sequence at the prom is effective because no one, friend or foe of Carrie’s is safe from her wrath. I did laugh when the telekinetic teenage was able to crack pavement so that an escaping teenager couldn’t getaway in his vehicle. Yet, all in all this upgrade is on par with the newly revamped Evil Dead and I’m starting to believe that resuscitating properties from the 70’s and 80’s may not be such a bad idea after all.

Directed by Kimberly Peirce
Stars: Chloë Grace Moretz, Julianne Moore, Gabriella Wilde