Carrie (2013) - A portrait of Western high school society instead of a straight splatter movie - 8/10 (23/10/13)

"Carrie" is based on a popular Steven King novel and has already been brought to the cinemas of this world in the seventies. This new version is a refreshing revamp and the topic is maybe more actual than ever before.

Students are more and more living in a world where their parents get divorced and only care about their careers. Young students get in contact with alcohol, drugs and sex at very young age and have nothing left to discover. Hypersexualisation is omnipresent in all medias where artificial American pop stars and models have replaced authentic and honourable idols. Young people struggle to accept authorities at home, at school and even in situations of their everyday lives. It's hard for them to face confusion and frustration and instead of being mature enough to criticize themselves and their families, they project their bad feelings on other relatives, teachers and class mates. The main targets are shy and somewhat different people at school which they only see as weird outcasts. I guess we all have seen or heard of students who refused to go to school because they were going through hell there or who even went as far to take their own precious lives. While Eastern societies have kept some respect for authorities, the so-called democratic and free Western world has led to a system where everybody is criticizing everything and having an opinion about anything. People often feel the need to become monsters themselves to face the monsters around them. This fast paced, individual, material world is no good place for those who try to be different. Carrie is a symbol for all those who are suffering at such a young age and her final revenge is a symbol for the growing fear, hatred and pain that those young people feel inside and can't catalyse. In every school in every town in the Western world, we have a few potential Carries walking around like time-bombs. School shootings and suicide rates among students show us where the worst places.  

This movie manages to stay close to the original novel. At the same time, the events are playing in the present and a few necessary details have been added. Carrie is not only bullied at school. She is also bullied in social media when the antagonists upload movies of her on Youtube. Social media are hard to control and have become an anonymous place where anybody feels free to spread news about other people. 

Apart of her struggles at school, she has to deal with an extremely religious and severe mother. In the opening moments, you see how the mother thinks about killing her newborn child with a knife. This scene really touched me. Religious fanaticism is another big problem in our societies. People think their religion is the only one that counts and they go very far to spread this message in sometimes very ignorant and violent ways. There is no problem at all with being religious but with hating and judging people who think differently.

Carrie's situation at home is not only connected to religious fanaticism but also to another problem in modern society. I'm talking about nuclear families with divorced parents, single parents, parents with new partners and so on. These days, people are having their first sexual experiences at a very young age and a lot of women get pregnant or even married before finishing their studies or having a stable job. These young parents always got everything and want to get everything no matter what. They want to have the perfect husband, they want to have many healthy children, they want to have a big house, a big television, a big car and the newest electronic devices, they want to have a job where there is not much to do but where they can get a lot of money, they want to go on vacation at least twice a year to escape from reality and so on. And while they are trying to get everything at the same time, their illusions are shattered and those who suffer are their own children who are growing up in a big mess. Carrie is growing up without a father and only hears bad things about him as she is completely controlled by her mother.

This movie tells us the progressive downfall of a young and beautiful girl who just tries to be normal and get new friends. She tries really hard to do so and is very mature and a few people really care for her in a good way like the gym teacher or another girl from the water ball team at school. But if you get so much hate from everybody around you day by day as Carrie gets, you start to meet everybody with anger, ignorance and suspicion. You won't let the few ones who try to help you get close to you because you don't want to get hurt again and everybody soon becomes a potential enemy.  

"Carrie" is a suspenseful drama and only becomes a horror movie once more than one hour has passed. What follows is a tale of emotional destruction of the world around Carrie and finally of herself. Most viewers empathize and sympathize with her but once people get out of the cinemas, they close their eyes and ignore the Carries in the real world. The final scene shows us that even a bloody massacre with hundreds of victims doesn't change a thing at all. Some people sprayed ugly graffiti on Carrie's grave telling her to go to hell. The bullying of that poor child even continues after her death.

If you care about thoughtful dramas and psychological suspense movies with strong character developments and good actors, this film is for you. Those who expect an atmospheric horror film or a splatter movie should look elsewhere.