Day 26 of the 2025 Halloween Horror Movie Marathon

It's hard to believe this gem turns fifty next year. It was a staple at the drive-in when I was a teenager, and the reason I didn't read the novel for so long. That was before I realized the book is always better.

This one holds up beautifully and remains one of the better adaptations of King's work. Sissy Spacek is Carrie , and Piper Laurie is Margaret White. Their Oscar nominations for the film were well deserved. The supporting cast is solid, particularly William Katt as Tommy, Betty Buckley as Miss Collins, Amy Irving as Sue Snell, and PJ Soles as a very nasty Norma Watson.

Even the dream sequence at the end retains its creepiness after all these years, a bit of a hat-tip to the James Dickey adaptation of his own novel, Deliverance. This is a film I come back to often and its message on bullying and the sense of "other" is timeless.