“…. Then, just when you think De Palma's Grand Guignol treatment of adolescence might be justified as a Carrie's eye view, he abruptly shifts focus. Carrie suddenly becomes a blood-red Golem, an avenging angel zapping every Prom-goer in sight as the auditorium burns. Naturally, this alienates our affections for her somewhat. Indeed, we find ourselves agreeing with Carrie's charred tormentors. She is a pretty weird kid….
“… [F]inally … the most disquieting thing about this lurid, manipulative film [is] it works. De Palma …. knows we'll respond like Pavlov's dogs … In Sissy Spacek, he has found the perfect foil, a pale sinewy girl at once remote and endearing, beautiful and scary. Dimly aware, nevertheless, that he cannot have, in one character, his heroine and his monster, too, De Palma adds an upright classmate of Carrie's with whom we are meant to sympathize when the Prom Queen proves too ghoulish. But… the film's characters and relationships, including the crucial one between Carrie and her mother, are sham….
Stephen Schiff
Boston Phoenix, date?
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