CARNIVAL OF SOULS (1962)
It’s always interesting to see a low-budget movie that is
minimal in all ways, whose limitations are clearly notable, and which still
succeeds on its own internal merits. Carnival
of Souls is such a movie, made in three weeks with a cast of nobodies and a
budget of just $30,000, most of which was raised from local businesses. The
director was Herk Harvey, whose only prior or future experience in filmmaking was
a long career in educational shorts. He claims he got the idea for the story,
which involves a girl (Candace Hilligoss) who seemingly survives a terrible car
crash and begins to see menacing apparitions everywhere she goes, from passing
by an abandoned amusement park that was so eerie it would provide the perfect
setting for a thriller. This very park area, which was located in Salt Lake City, is the
one seen in the movie.
Carnival of Souls
has become an underground classic through the years, mostly helped by
late-night TV airings thanks to the film’s reported public domain status. It is
a fascinating picture for many reasons, the most obvious being that it really
does work on a base level. The ghost was played by Harvey himself and he would
often appear in full makeup for revival screenings and interviews in the years
to come. This menacing character is the first image of the film that is brought
to the viewer’s memory, because he is one of the most truly frightening figures
in popular horror history, helped by his only brief and very sudden appearances
throughout the film. The effect of his scenes is still jarring today, even
though these moments aren’t accompanied by loud blasts of music like the modern
thrillers are so keen to use. I find one moment particularly alarming, when the
figure suddenly appears in the girl’s mirror, and such moments work because
they are so wisely underplayed.
The ghost is never properly explained over the course of the
movie and neither is the young lady’s state of mind, which lends the movie a
mysterious air that makes it puzzling in a Twilight Zone-esque way without ever
becoming confusing. This has led to many fan interpretations that may or may
not be accurate and which are largely unsupported by any actual evidence in the
film. Carnival of Souls is not a
great movie because it is scarier than others or because it offers some big
puzzle for viewers to put together, though it is often treated this way. It is
great as an example of quality overcoming poverty. Harvey took a real-life moment that he
experienced, the creepiness of the abandoned amusement park, and created a lasting,
accessible version of it, a movie that shares that creepy feeling with everyone
who sees it.
The greatest scary movies are always minimal in their
presentation, and Harvey
uses the necessity of his very small budget and his documentary experience to successfully
render a cinematic version of fear, using atmosphere and suggestion more than
shocks. Those who discover Carnival of
Souls almost always cling to it, because they can recognize that unique
thrill it possesses when compared to the bigger shock movies of the era. It
really is something special.
VALERIE AND HER WEEK
OF WONDERS (1970)
Valerie and Her Week
of Wonders was a Czechoslovakian novel written by surrealist Vitezslav Nezval
and published in 1932. It was a fantasy tale about a young girl who wanders a
disturbing world in which she encounters priests who are secretly vampires,
relatives who want to kill her, animals that are also humans, and mobs that
gladly sacrifice her when falsely told she committed sins. The novel in its
surreal, whimsical and gothic style is an analogy for the onset of womanhood
and, thanks to an English translation, has been recently rediscovered as a
forgotten literary classic. The 1970 film directed by Jaromil Jires and
starring child actress Jaroslava Schallerova is also making a reappearance in
the film world, having been largely unseen since its release, but now available
on DVD.
The film follows the same dreamlike structure of the novel,
though the plot is somewhat more hurried (The biggest difference between the
two is the film changing Valerie’s age from 17 to 13, reflecting a more
60s-accurate age for a girl having her first period.). I also feel the
whimsical nature of the novel is not accurately presented in the film, which
may or may not be a fault. The movie embraces the darker aspects of the story,
most notably in the Weasel character, so named because of his weasel-shaped
mask and for his occasional transformations into an actual weasel. He is
Valerie’s father or perhaps grandfather and has a young assistant named Eagle,
who becomes Valerie’s first love interest. The appearance of the Weasel would
complement any horror movie, what with his Nosferatu-like pale face, protruding
teeth and pointed ears. This menacing figure provides some of the movie’s most
memorable images, such as when he sneaks up on Valerie and envelops her in his
black cloak, or when he goes into a sudden frenzy, violently whipping
everything in sight, even startlingly setting a water fountain on fire.
Jires’ movie does have problems. The novel’s allusions to
menstruation are subtle enough to almost go unnoticed, while the movie is
almost annoyingly blatant. Close-ups of blood dripping on flowers and the long
shot of red wine spilling all over a white tablecloth are obvious when
suggestion would have been more effective. Even more egregious is the movie’s
stubborn insistence on always reminding us that we are watching Valerie’s dream,
a fact that is left ambivalent in the novel and should have remained so in the
film. Instead of allowing the movie to simply be surreal, Jires has Valerie
flat out saying, “This isn’t real. I am only dreaming,” and closes the movie
with a scene in which all the characters dance around Valerie’s bed. Mr. Jires,
could you be any more obvious?
What Valerie and Her
Week of Wonders lacks in subtlety, it makes up for in imagination. It
wouldn’t have worked at all if the fantasy scenes hadn’t been so mesmerizing. Through
the scenes of vampirism, some restraint is preserved. The sudden violence that
interrupts an otherwise light and colorful movie is like the sudden onset of a
new adult world and the terrors it contains. For these moments, and for the creative
and haunting fantasy world the film creates, it still has value.
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