The “Carrie” Remake Is Looking…Surprisingly Good

The first full trailer is out for the remake of Stephen King’s “Carrie” which was originally made into an iconic 1976 film by Brian DePalma and starring a whole bunch of “nobodies” who ended up as stars: Sissy Spacek, Amy Irving, John Travolta, Nancy Allen and P.J. Soles among them.

“Carrie” has had a shitty sequel, (also with Amy Irving), a TV remake and even been turned into a notorious stage musical, but the new “Carrie” is a remake of the original book and stars Chloë Grace Moretz as Carrie and Julianne Moore as her religiously fanatical mother, Margaret, a role originally played by Piper Laurie. Both Ms Laurie and Sissy Spacek earned Oscar nominations for the original film, an unusual turn of events for actors performing in a horror film.

The new film, directed by Kimberly Peirce (best known for “Boys Don’t Cry”), looks like it’s closely following the original novel/film but has been obviously updated…now, when Carrie is tormented in the infamous shower scene at the beginning of the film, her abusers document the encounter with their cell phones. (Classy!) And, the scenes involving Carrie demonstrating her telekinetic power are more sophisticated and complex. It also looks like we’re going to see Carrie’s path of destruction as she flees the high school prom massacre and wrecks havoc through the streets of her town as she heads to her home. The novel depicted those scenes, but they were omitted from the DePalma film for budgetary reasons.

What do you think of this trailer? It looks scary as hell; certainly the prom massacre looks far more violent than the original, which relied on DePalma’s slick camera work and editing to depict the horror. The 2013 version looks far more graphic. And, while Julianne Moore looks appropriately dried out and vindictive as crazy Mama, we’ll have to say that Ms Moretz is a bit too cute looking to pass for a downtrodden social pariah. Sissy Spacek, like the majority of the “teen” cast in the 1976 film was in her 20’s when she played the role, but her appearance and acting convincingly portrayed her as a misfit teen. Her transformation from drudge to prom queen was highly effective. Not so sure how they’ll pull that off in the new film since Ms Moretz is rather adorable from the get go.

You’ll have to wait until October 18, 2013 to check out the new “Carrie”. The film was originally scheduled to premiere in March, but was pushed back to grab the lucrative Halloween horror film market…and, probably help the film grab end of year awards consideration.

Can “Carrie” strike twice when it comes to Oscar love?