Time Spent Watching Movies

Time Spent Watching Movies 3 Days 14 Hours 23 Minutes

Thursday, October 17, 2013

Carnival of Souls October Movie #7 (Movie #92)


Carnival of Souls (1962)


http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0055830/?ref_=nv_sr_3

A car full of dudes pulls up next to a car full of chicks and they decide to race. Everything goes fine until the two cars pull onto a bridge and the dudes start doing some bumping. This sends the girls car over the railings and into the river.  Opening credits. The driver of the guy’s car is interviewed by the cops and tells them that they just lost control. 

Authorities can't find the car but randomly a chick comes out of the water after what must be hours. Her name is Mary and she's leaving town to take the job as an organist somewhere else. That’s a lot to think about over a few days.  While driving through Utah to her new home, she sees the face of a man looking into her window and another creepy figure in the middle of the road. When Mary arrives to her new apartment she witnesses the face there too. On the way into town she passes an old abandoned carnival, which I am assuming is full of souls.

 Falling in water with your clothes on is always funny.

Lets see, her neighbor across the hall tries to hit on her and she goes to the mall one day and randomly no one can see or hear her. Maybe she's dead. Whatever it is, I’m sure it’s just the normal things we all deal with.  She keeps seeing the creepy guy everywhere but she's the only one. Mary eventually attracts the attention of a psychiatrist by acting goofy at a water fountain and he connects her problems to old carnival.  That sounds good enough to her and she takes a trip out there. After much investigating she finds it to be a ghost town except for when she throws a stone in the lake and it lands on the creepy guy who’s face she keeps seeing’s body but she misses it.



 Peek-a-Boo!

Some time later Mary goes into a trance while at work and plays creepy organ music, which seems to wake up carnival zombies. They are legitimately creepy, especially the main one.  The priest pops in and thinks the music is evil which causes him to fire her on the spot.  Right as she is leaving, her neighbor picks her up to go on a date to which she is understandably not into.  They head back to their building and he drunkenly asks for the date to keeping going towards the bedroom

 How emo is this guy?

He comes up from behind her and lays a kiss on her neck but the only thing is in the mirror the old man from the carnival is doing the kissing.  She freaks out and says zombies are after her.  Smartly, the neighbor decides he doesn’t need that kind of crazy and heads back to his room.  Tearfully Mary calls after him saying that she doesn’t want to be left alone.

Mary leaves town but has a problem with her car causing her to drive it to a shop.  She stays in her car as it’s raised on the lift meaning she’s stuck up there.  Someone creeps into the building and lowers the lift.  Mary runs to the bus station and the thing where no once can see or hear her happens again.  Over the intercom she hears that a bus is loading and when she gets on it she finds that its full incredibly creepy smiling zombies.  Mary gets away and runs all around the city only to be ignored by everyone.  She rushes to the doctor’s office and tells him that he’s her only hope.  His chair is turned and slowly he faces the camera to show us that it’s the zombie and he pulls out a creepy smile.  Luckily for Mary, it’s all a dream.

Scariest thing I've seen all month, no joke.


It’s back to the carnival for Mary who is still in need of answers.  One needs to be to how did I end up in Utah.  The zombies all come out of the lake and eerily dance around while Mary watches.  She watches a zombie version of her dancing with the creepy guy.  Mary screams while running away and is now chased by the zombies.  She falls and the cameras turn to black.  The next scene shows the police examining the carnival where she was last seen.  Footprints lead up to her location and then nothing.  They also finally found the car that the chicks crashed off the bridge on and what do you know, Mary is inside there.  She was dead the whole time and didn’t know it.

Favorite Scene: Mary standing at the carnival watching herself dance with the main zombie.  Eeek!

Memorable Lines: “I don’t belong in the world”

“Expert” Reviews: Jonathan Rosenbaum says “There isn't very much here to sustain interest.” I can say the same about you.
Steve Crum says “Much overrated horror, not even minor classic in this corner” Really Steve?  Not even a little good?

Rating: 7.1 Milky Ways.  The middle of this movie is sloooooooow but the last 20 minutes or so are so good that it still gets a high rating.  The twist is predictable but still pretty cool for 1962.  The zombies were terrifying for having no effects and the actual carnival looks good.  The movie is only 78 minutes long but still dragged.  I’d watch it again

Alternate Ending: Mary spends more than 10 minutes at the carnival.  She is trapped there and has to stay there until they find the car in the river.

What I would do if I were the main character: Get an exorcism

What happens in the sequel: I would love to see a prequel about how things went so bad at the carnival. 

Catching up

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