MovieChat Forums > Carrie (2002) Discussion > Something I've noticed

Something I've noticed

posted 15 years ago by Mr-Awesome
16 replies | jump to latest

Is that many people who hated this movie seemed not to have read the book. A lot of detractors when citing things they didn't like with this tv movie mention things taken directly from the book. (Margret being killed by a heart attack, stones coming down at the white house, the police investigation,Miss Desjardin surviving) I mean I do feel that the original is a superior film though I don't think the remake/update had much of a chance since while the original was treated as a film, the tv version is clearly treated like a three part tv mini-series.
The weirdest comments I've heard about this version are concerning Bettis's performance as Carrie saying she was too weird (one youtube comment I read stated she was ugly) well um Carrie isn't suppose to be beautiful or normal so...yeah.

[–] EarthAD 15 years ago

I seem to run into that as well. Carrie is one of the first adult novels I ever read at age 12 and its still one of my favorites to this day. Here is my view on the whole thing:

The original is a classic, yes. And I love that movie. I'm not saying the remake is better, but its more according to the book. This has been one of my biggest movie arguments on these message boards for awhile. Angela Bettis was a more realistic Carrie... Sissy Spacek is a beautiful redhead and she was just a name at the time. I felt that the actors picked in the remake were more "high school looking" and looked like normal kids. Piper Laurie will always scare me, lol but I felt Patricia Clarkson played her like how I imagined her in the book. Above all the other characters, Chris (Emilie de Raven) and Billy (Jesse Cadotte) were portrayed more like manipulative, intelligent, mentally unstable people. Whereas Nancy Allen and John Travolta were just pretty faced, simple minded bullies. They were one-dimensional I guess you would say.

I love Kandyse McClure, but I felt Amy Irving portrayed Sue better. As well as the original Miss Desjardins (the gym teacher).

And Carrie's body was never found and Sue was definitely hiding something from the police. Nothing was ever revealed but I kinda liked how they ended the original Carrie more than the remake.

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How am I not myself?

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[–] Mr-Awesome 15 years ago

I believe she straightens her hair so it's not a ratty mess anymore and she does fix her posture. And what's dumb is that people are commenting on Bettis's looks as a whole not just the prom scene. And throughout most of the movie Carrie isn't suppose to be beautiful and Bettis isn't hideous or anything.

[–] Normal-Bates 15 years ago

Angela and Sissy were both amazing. Although the original is a superior film, I do believe the TV adaptation is a better adaptation but an inferior film, but still very good. I prefer the insane Piper Laurie/Margaret in the original and not the calm Patricia Clarkson in the TV movie, but I liked more Miss Desjardin in the remake than Miss Collins in the original.

And the TV adaptation also included something the original didn't: Carrie's poem on Jesus' face being "cold as stone".

[–] kgdakotafan 15 years ago

Actually in the book Carrie is supposed to be a naturally gorgeous girl who ate pie that gave her acne, and who ate too much and became fat to fill her gap of loneliness. Neither Angela Bettis nor Sissy Spacek were fat enough for Carrie. This disturbed me

JUST ACCEPT IT!

[–] ricky_says_hi 15 years ago

the only thing really i preferred about the original was Piper Laurie. Margaret White was a cruel and derranged woman and Patricia Clarkson just didn't do the character justice. she was alright but she needed to be a little more crazy

one thing i absolutely hated about the original was Miss Collins. she was awful, in the book she is a caring woman but she is also a hardass won't take *beep* from anyone type of woman and Betty Buckley just was awful playing her as judged by the scene where she tells the girls off. Rena Sofer was superior in every way

There's something about flying a kite at night that's so unwholesome

[–] waterdrops9 14 years ago

I like it if Carrie isn't beautiful in the movie. It's more realistic.

[–] glassrose385 14 years ago

I read the book about five or six months before NBC aired the remake. While I was watching the remake I noticed a lot of the references to the book that the 1976 movie didn't include. The OP mentioned several of them. In the book Carrie was born at home and Margaret claimed to not know she was pregnant. One of the early shots is of Margaret with the baby on the floor. Also the stones falling from the sky was in the book. There were scenes shot of that part shot for the '76 film which were cut of the film. There were several minor details from the book included in the remake. In the remake the detective reads Sue an email that Chris sent a friend who moved away. In the book a letter that Chris sent to the friend is mentioned. The remake simply updated that detail from the book for the modern day. Also the book talks about the evidence about the true winners of king and queen and this also gets mentioned in the remake.

As another poster pointed out in the book Carrie is described as a chubby girl. In both movie versions a chubby girl wouldn't have been cast because the filmmakers would need the audience to believe that Tommy would genuinely fall in love or at least like Carrie after awhile.

I did like the 2002 Chris and Billy more because they seemed more intense.

[–] billwenham 14 years ago

...because people don't fall in love with chubby people...

[–] bethan_emily 14 years ago

I hated the 2002 Billy, he had nothing going for him. The original (John Travolta) was at least attractive and could act, but this one annoyed the hell out of me. The original Chris was way better too, she was funny and cleverly bitchy, whilst this one was just bitchy, and you couldn't see her being popular at all.

As for the Carries, I like them equally. Neither of them looked like the original Carrie was meant to be, but they were still good. I can understand more why Sissy's Carrie was bullied at the beginning, the actually ran out screaming for help and grabbed people with her bloody hands, which would have disgusted the other girls who knew what periods were. But that still doesn't make what they did any better, but it makes the girls in the 2002 version seem bitchier because Angela's Carrie didn't even draw attention to herself. I actually prefer the majority of the 1976 version's characters, bar the gym teacher.

[–] bufalo73 13 years ago

IIRC Tommy wasn't in love with Carrie in the book. He just treat her right, as a human been unlike the rest of the people. So Carrie sees as love what is just being nice because she isn't used to it. And Tommy likes her (as a person) because he gets to know her and finds she is not the "monster" everyone sees.

P.S.: Is the last page of the book in the movie?

[–] ricky_may1 13 years ago

This remake was FAR superior to the 76 film. it was more intense closer to the source material and better acted. Maybe im biased because i read the book before i seen both films and guess after seeing the original and liking it was expecting the remake to be poorer by comparison, however i felt the original fell flat when compared to this film. This should have been released in theaters as well i think.

[–] mixedmed 13 years ago

Yeah I find it funny that a lot of people slam the movie for scenes that were actually in the book. One of the things that I did enjoy about the remake was that they included elements of the investigation throughout the movie and that they included some scenes from the book that the 1976 version left out. I liked the "sassier" version of Sue Snell in this version and I also like the portrayal of Miss Desjardin. I also like the characterizations of Chris and Billy as well. The 1976 movie actually made Chris a lot worse than she really was and made Billy a lot more of a clueless stooge than he really was in the book. This version got their characterizations right.

That being said, I think that the 1976 captured the "horror" atmosphere much better than this version, especially in scenes between Carrie and Margaret. Margaret White was way understated and not at all frightening in this version. Not only did she often abuse Carrie in the book, but she often took to hitting, scratching, and punching herself when she got wound up. She was a complete loon in the book and in the original movie and the new Margaret White didn't cut it.

The CGI special effects...oy. They were bad even for TV. It would have been better to have no effects as opposed to bad ones. The 1976 version did better with the effects they had than this updated version did.

And I agree that Bettis' performance was too weird. The shaking bug eyed expression was far too overdone with too few other emotions to balance it out. Carrie was supposed to be frightened, naive, and shy...not shaking and going cross-eyed like she was suffering from a seizure. And twirling her hair into dreads...WTH was that? It got to be annoying after a while and it actually made me less sympathetic towards Carrie. Perhaps it made more sense as far as seeing why people picked on Carrie, it didn't do much to make me like her, and she's the one we're supposed to identify with. As far as the "ugly" thing, I never got the impression that Carrie was supposed to be ugly...just that perhaps she was plain to average looking and her demeanor and clothing made her "seem" ugly. Which is why a bit of makeup and nice clothes made such a difference when she went to the prom.

And the ending was a "WTF" moment for me. While even the 1976 version didn't go with the original book ending, it was much scarier and much more in the spirit of the book than the remake's was.

[–] lockon_stratos 11 years ago

Never read the book but I like this TV version more. Liking something just because it's original is not original anymore.

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