Carrie

The seventies brought some of the most seminal moments of the horror genre. Halloween paved the way for the slasher films of the eighties and later the Scream trilogy. There was also the ground breaking The Exorcist and The Omen, both films dealing with horrors of the satanic kind before Alien finished off the decade by transporting the genre into outer space.

Despite such a high standard of horror films being produced Carrie still manages to stand out in its own right. An adaptation of a best-selling Stephen King novel, the film follows Carrie, an outsider who lives in fear of her zealous Christian mother and the school bullies. Carrie discovers that she has telekinetic powers and after a particularly cruel trick involving a bucket of pigs� blood is played on her at the school prom. She then proceeds to make use of her new-found powers to devastating effect. Her mother is subject to an equally horrific and prolonged act of revenge from her daughter involving a mock crucifixion with kitchen knives.

From the opening scene of Carrie being traumatized by the onset of her first period, the film deals in unsettling and graphic images right up until its famous shock ending. It doesn�t condemn Carrie but rather those around her who make her life a misery. Sissy Spacek is totally convincing as the gothic Cinderella as is Piper Laurie as her religious fanatic mother. Brian De Palma has gone on to prove himself time and again as a director with films like Scarface and The Untouchables, but with Carrie he provides cinema and horror with some of its most lasting images.

Emma Seldon