Carrie, horror and religion

Revisiting Carrie, Brian De Palma’s adaptation of Stephen King’s debut novel, for the first time in a long while, it is striking just how effective, unsettling and, at times, genuinely disturbing it is. It was also intriguing how prominent religion was in the overall narrative and how, as in other classic horror films of the period, its supposed power for good could be distorted into a power of evil.

Like Rosemary’s Baby, Carrie is unsettling from the outset with the use of music and camerawork in its opening titles. As the camera pans into a high school girls changing room, the music is reminiscent of melodramas and soap operas rather than horror. It is this juxtaposition, however, of such seemingly disparate worlds that lends a feeling of subdued dread at a very early stage. The audience’s expectations are of horror and shocking moments to come. In the case of those having already seen the film, they would know what to expect which makes this opening all the more effective.
The music and the soft focus cinematography provide a feeling of nostalgia and despair. As melodramas and soap’s are set in the home, school and places frequented by people every day and therefore provide a supposed insight into normal people’s lives, there is also that ever-present sense of bleakness and despair that can be found in the monotony of life. This scene combines these emotions to great effect. Within the school- such a mundane and everyday environment, great suffering and horror will take place.

The film’s opening is key in setting the tone of the film and laying down the foundations for the themes and motifs that encompass it. In the 7-8 minute scene, the issues of high school, personal insecurities, sex, religion and pain are all covered either directly or indirectly and go to the heart of what is important in the film.
The scene in question follows Carrie White (Sissy Spacek) as she undergoes a full-scale panic attack at the discovery of her first period. Rather than go to her aid, her cackling and almost animalistic female classmates goad her, laugh at her and throw tampons on her prone body in a mixture of mockery and disgust. As Carrie lies on the shower floor we are shown shots of bloody water slipping down the drain. At this point we don’t know why such cruelty could take place and why Carrie would be so frightened and confused at the sight of her first period. It is when we meet her psychotic fundamentalist Christian mother, Margaret (Piper Laurie) that we begin to understand the cause of Carrie’s problems.

After the pain and humiliation of the changing room incident, Carrie is sent home. Carrie’s house, which becomes almost a character in its own right, is first revealed to us. Occupied by the marginalised, hated and misunderstood, the White’s house is a place of torture and darkness. Carrie’s mother is a fundamentalist Christian who has clearly lost her grasp on sanity if, indeed, she ever had it. She tears and scratches at Carrie when she is told of her daughter’s period. Margaret White calls her daughter a whore and a slut ravaged with impurities who must have, through a deal with the devil or promiscuity, brought this filthy shame upon herself due to her own amoral behaviour.
It is during these harrowing scenes between Carrie and her mother that the issue of religion is bought into being a central theme of the film. Like some of the most effective and frightening horror films of the 1960’s and 70’s such as Rosemary’s Baby, The Exorcist and The Wicker Man, Carrie’s uses religion to demonstrate good and evil but also as a driving factor and motivation for Margaret, arguably the film’s most evil character, to distort to her own sick end.

The White house, pardon the pun, is littered with unsettling religious iconography. Margaret attempts to create a place of sanctity and purity that can act as a church. The multitude of candles she places around the house on it’s window sills, on stairs and on the floor, all serve to provide an allusion that what we are seeing are not the candles of a church but of the many fires of hell.

Perhaps the most disturbing religious object in the house is something that goes to the very heart of the fine line that exists in this film between heaven and hell, God and Satan, good and evil. When Margaret wishes to punish Carrie she is forced to stand within a small, almost cell-like cavity or inlet within the lower floor of the house. Amongst other things in the room there is a small statue or figure of Jesus on the cross. When Carrie is believed to have sinned or carried out impure acts such as having her first period, Margaret shoves her in the alcove where the statue of Jesus awaits her almost acting as the auditor of her confession. However, as is the so often the case in this film and the other horror films I have mentioned, religion is not always a cause for good. In the case of this room and this statue of Jesus, it is a gateway to hell and the menacingly illuminated orange eyes of the Christ figure show the figure of ultimate religious evil is ready to lead Carrie into the underworld.