Showing posts with label Sissy Spacek. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Sissy Spacek. Show all posts

Sunday, September 6, 2015

Carrie 1976

 Released Year: 1976
Directed by Brian De Palma

Casted by:
Sissy Spacek as Carrie White
Piper Laurie as Margaret White
Amy Irving as Sue Snell
William Katt as Tommy Ross
Betty Buckley as Miss Collins
Nancy Allen as Chris Hargensen
John Travolta as Billy Nolan
P. J. Soles as Norma Watson
 Story
Carrie White, a shy and friendless 17-year-old girl, is the scapegoat of her school in North Carolina. At home she is abused by her mentally unstable mother Margaret, who is a Christian fundamentalist.

While in the showers after gym class, Carrie experiences her abnormally delayed first period. Having no prior knowledge of menstruation, Carrie believes she is bleeding to death. The other girls, including Chris Hargensen and Sue Snell, add to her shame and humiliation by pelting her with tampons and sanitary pads. The gym teacher Miss Collins intervenes and as Carrie becomes more frantic, a light bulb bursts in the showers.

Miss Collins brings Carrie to the principal's office to excuse her from gym class for the next week. After Carrie grows angry from the principal repeatedly mispronouncing her name, an ashtray on his desk suddenly flips onto the floor. As Carrie walks home a boy on a bicycle taunts her. When Carrie glares at him, the boy immediately crashes and hurts himself. At home, Margaret receives a call from Miss Collins about the shower incident. Margaret tells Carrie that the "curse of blood" is divine punishment for sin and forces her to confess before locking her into a dark and cramped prayer closet to pray for forgiveness. A vengeful Carrie stares at her bedroom mirror until it shatters.

The next day, the other students laugh at her when she says that classmate Tommy Ross's poem is "beautiful". Miss Collins subjects Carrie's PE class to a week-long boot-camp-style detention, threatening the students with suspension from school and the prom if they do not attend. Chris becomes defiant and is slapped by Collins; Chris storms out, unremorseful of her prom ban. Sue convinces Tommy to invite Carrie to the prom.

Carrie suspects she may have telekinesis. While researching in the library, Tommy invites her to the prom, but she declines, fearing another trick. Tommy later visits Carrie's house and repeats his invitation, which she eventually accepts. Carrie tells her mother she is going to the prom, but Margaret declares the prom a sinful occasion. Carrie reveals her telekinesis by causing all the windows to slam shut, leading Margaret to believe she is a witch. Carrie insists on going to the prom, and Margaret reluctantly accepts.

Chris tells her delinquent boyfriend Billy Nolan that she wants revenge on Carrie. She goes with Billy and some of his friends to a local farm, where Billy and his friends slaughter pigs and store the pigs' blood in a bucket. Billy then sneaks into the school and places the bucket above the school's stage. As Carrie prepares for the evening, her mother tries to discourage her from going to the prom, claiming that "They're all gonna laugh at you!" Carrie's classmates are surprised to see her at the prom, and several girls point and snicker. After Miss Collins comforts her with stories of her own prom, Carrie begins to enjoy herself and dances blissfully with Tommy, who gives her a first kiss. Sue, who was unable to attend due to lacking a date, sneaks into the prom to ensure everything goes well for Carrie.

To Carrie's surprise but according to Chris and Billy's plan, she and Tommy are named prom king and queen. As the two approach the stage, Sue discovers Chris holding a rope attached to the bucket. Before Sue can warn Carrie, Miss Collins forces her out. The crown is placed on Carrie's head, then Chris pulls the rope and Carrie is drenched in the pig's blood. Chris and Billy escape the gym laughing, as Tommy is knocked unconscious by the falling bucket. Carrie hallucinates that the whole room is laughing at her in mass hysteria.

Carrie snaps into a cold rage, and telekinetically seals the exits. She then manipulates a fire hose and it blasts several students to their deaths at a tremendous force. As Miss Collins attempts to escape the chaos with a group, Carrie telekinetically seperates her from the group and pins her to the wall. She proceeds to cause a basketball goal post to collapse and swing onto Miss Collin's body, dismembering her, which the horrified Chris and Billy witness from a high window. The water makes contact with the wirings, igniting a massive fire in the gym.

Carrie leaves the inferno in the gym and begins walking home, covered in blood. Chris and Billy attempt to run Carrie over with Billy's car, but Carrie telekinetically flips the car over and causes it to explode, killing them.

Carrie returns home and takes a bath to wash off the pig's blood, and puts on her nightgown. She encounters Margaret and breaks down in her arms. Margaret confesses to Carrie that she and her husband Ralph believed that sex was a sin and abstained from it, until he got drunk one night and raped her, which she actually enjoyed. She embraces Carrie as the two recite the Lord's Prayer together, but halfway through the prayer, Margaret stabs Carrie in the back with a butcher's knife. Carrie falls down the stairs and is cornered in the kitchen by a crazed Margaret, who attempts to stab her more. Carrie's telekinesis is adrenalized, and all the knives and sharp objects in the kitchen are sent hurtling into her mother, crucifying her in the doorway. Carrie screams and unhooks her mother as the house starts to shake, which then collapses onto them.

Some time later, Sue, the sole survivor of the prom massacre, has a dream in which she visits the lot where Carrie's house once stood. As she places flowers on the ground, Carrie's bloody hand shoots out of the ground and grabs her elbow—then Sue wakes up screaming in her mother's arms.
  L² Scored: 9.5/10

L² Comment:
I love girl who has telekinesis power, its so good to see when they lost control, as they will get angry and smash everything into pieces haha~ Well, the movie is based on Stephen King's first major novel in 1974 with the same name. Sissy Spacek has also won her few awards from this movie. Surprise to see young John Travolta here, he is really a fine good looking guy :)

Thursday, December 2, 2010

In The Bedroom

Released Year: 2001
Directed by Todd Field

Casted by:
Tom Wilkinson as Matt Fowler
Sissy Spacek as Ruth Fowler
Marisa Tomei as Natalie Strout
William Mapother as Richard Strout
Nick Stahl as Frank Fowler
Story:
Frank was supposed to continue his study at somewhere else, but he fall in love with Natalie, who is a mother of 2 children. But Natalie's husband, Richard is full of jealousy and killed Frank when Richard confronted Frank at Natalie's house.

Due to lack of witness, Richard is claim as innocent. Frank's parents, Matt & Ruth are very angry and annoying of seeing Richard still fool around in the city. To make sure Ruth feel better, Matt kidnap Richard and killed him. Later on Matt disposed the body and return back to Ruth.
L² Scored: 5/10

L² Comment:
This film get a lots of nomination awards in 2001 and it won Best film, best director, best actor, best actress & best supporting actress in multiple film awards except academy awards(oscar). But for me, its a bit boring and a big yawn~ :(

From the story written by Andre Dubus "Killing", but i really dont understand why they name this film as "In The Bedroom"... it really does not mean anything at all~

Thursday, September 16, 2010

Four Christmases

Released Year: 2008
Directed by Seth Gordon

Casted by:
Vince Vaughn as Brad McVie "Orlando"
Reese Witherspoon as Kate
Robert Duvall as Howard McVie, Brad's father
Sissy Spacek as Paula, Brad's mother
Jon Voight as Creighton, Kate's father
Mary Steenburgen as Marilyn, Kate's mother
Kristin Chenoweth as Courtney, Kate's Sister
Jon Favreau as Denver McVie, Brad's brother
Tim McGraw as Dallas McVie, Brad's brother
Story:
Orlando "Brad" McVie and his girlfriend, Kate are a happily unmarried and childfree, upscale San Franscisco couple whose respective households are somewhat similar - both bearing divorced parents, warring siblings with out-of-control kids and general awkward memories and simmering resentments from the past, which they find too embarrassing to share with each other.

In an effort to avoid these families at Christmas time, Brad and Kate pretend to be engaging in charitable work and escape to exotic sun-spots, such as Fiji, to enjoy a relaxing Christmas there. Unfortunately, in the third Christmas of their relationship, Brad and Kate are trapped at San Francisco International Airport by a fogbank that cancels every outbound flight. To make matters worse, they are caught on camera and then interviewed by a CBS 5 news crew, revealing their whereabouts to the whole city and, worst of all, their families.

With no escape, their lies foiled and no excuses to make, they find themselves unable to avoid a Christmas at home with their respective families. They first visit Brad's father, then Kate's mother, and then Brad's mother and, finally, Kate's father, thereby celebrating four Christmases in one day. As they brace themselves for a marathon of homecomings, Brad and Kate expect the worst, but are nevertheless unable to prepare themselves enough for what they get. As the day progresses, each discover a new secret about each other that both had been too embarrassed to tell each other about, and soon find their relationship on the verge of collapse.

While Brad counts down the minutes to freedom, Kate finds herself looking at the lives of Brad's and her own siblings and realises that she does want a marriage and children of her own, the prospect of which frightens Brad. Eventually, in the final visit of the day, at Kate's father's house, Kate asks Brad to let her spend the visit on her own and claims to her family that they had split up. Meanwhile, Brad spends some time at his own father's house with just his father and realises how empty his life is without a marriage and children, and that he loves Kate much too much to leave her.

He returns to her and they discuss the possibilities of having a child and getting married. The two then embark on their holiday in Fiji. A year later on New Year's Day, the couple welcomes their first born child, a baby girl, which they have spent the last nine months hiding from their families. However, as their baby is the first born in the New Year, a news crew comes to congratulate them - once again revealing them, and their new baby to the whole city, and their families.
L² Scored: 6/10

L² Comment:
A relaxing comedy love story is always nice to watch while spending ur time at home alone. Wow, Vince Vaughn is so damn tall !!! Or is it Reese Witherspoon too short?