[.ca] Carnival Of Souls

Additional Features:
Herk Harvey's spooky little cult wonder, Carnival of Souls (1962), was, according to the director, initially inspired by the spooky sight of the abandoned Salt Palace. The lonely, crumbling edifice standing on the beach of the Great Salt Lake became the setting for the film's memorably creepy climax. "We hoped for the look of a Bergman film and the feel of Cocteau," remarks Harvey on the commentary track of Criterion's deluxe DVD, but this low-budget labor of love more resembles the lyricism of Curtis Harrington's eerie fantasy, Night Tide. In addition to the commentary track--edited together from interviews with Harvey and writer John Clifford and which leaves a few long gaps--Criterion's gorgeous double-disc set is packed with supplements. Two respectful 1989 documentaries produced by a Kansas TV station celebrate the film's rerelease with interviews, a cast and crew reunion, and a "then and now" tour of locations. Clips and short films from Harvey's industrial film company, Centron, are curious artifacts of a bygone era. The generous collection of outtakes (accompanied by the film's organ score) gets a bit tedious, but reveals some interesting experiments with special effects and the then-novel zoom lens. Criterion offers two different cuts of the film--the 85-minute director's cut and the shorter theatrical version trimmed of 7 minutes by the producers. Both prints are clean, clear, and luminescent. Carnival of Souls probably never looked this good in the theaters. --Sean Axmaker

Amazon.com Essential Video:
An ultra-cheap B-horror movie, filmed in Lawrence, Kansas, in 1962, with a really creepy Twilight Zone-style premise and some great shoestring atmosphere. Wandering into a small town after an auto accident, to begin her new job as a church organist, young Mary Henry (Candace Hilligoss) begins to pick up strange vibes: none of the normal people in town seem to be able to see her, and she keeps being accosted by freakish pasty-faced types who seem to be dead on their feet. The nightmarish finale benefits from its one-of-a-kind "found" setting, an empty amusement park rising like a ghostly castle from the prairie landscape. This is much less aggressive and violent film than George Romero's original Night of the Living Dead, but for sheer skin- crawling spookiness, it's in the same class. --David Chute --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Disturbing and Creepy cult classic comes to DVD!!!:
Carnival of Souls was made on a shoe-string budget by industrial filmmaker Herk Harvey and stars the enigmatic and beautiful Candace Hilligoss as the lead character who manages to be constantly isolated from everyone around her. There are so many excellent transitions and shots in the movie it was obvious that who ever put it together had been an excellent film editior at the very least. As the film has been extensively reviewed here I want to focus on the DVD releases. Aside from the original cut of the film, 82 minutes, there where several prints that had been trimmed down both by the director and perhaps for TV although I have seen the complete film on cable as well as edited versions. The Image "movie-only" release (by the way Image also co-produced the Criterion Collection release) has the complete version of the movie and best print that I have seen. There is an active menu with some of the spooky organ music with icons for chapters and the films trailer. At first I thought the icon for "recommendations" was just a link to a one page marketing promo. However, if you click on the title boxes you get a trailer for each of the other Image releases shown. Quite a nice little "Easter Egg"! I am glad I have the other versions as well because I think the edited prints are also interesting. The Alpha Video version actually has a slightly higher bit rate than the Image edition and only a tiny amount of pixelization here and there detracts from a very sharp picture, it clocks in at 77 minutes and is a great bargain. The Diamond DVD release has an identical running time, but a lower bit rate and still some pixelization in a couple of scenes. However considering that you get a copy of 1960's "Horror Hotel" with Christopher Lee included it is a great buy for just a few bucks. Curiously, the Diamond edition "Carnival of Souls/"Horror Hotel" is supposedly out of print yet I found a copy in a store recently and got another new copy on-line for my little brother's collection. Goodtimes has released "Carnival of Souls" with a high bit rate and sharp picture but a few more skips and pops. Also, the running time is the shortest, 75 minutes, as it cuts out a couple more scenes such as when Candace Hilligoss stops for gas and directions entering Salt Lake City. However, my Goodtimes edition is a two sided disc with "Carnival" on one side and a decent print of "Night of the Living Dead" on the other. For those of you who don't like two sided discs, Goodtimes has also released both films seperately for just a few bucks each. Criterion Collection has released the utlimate edition with two cuts of the film and loads of extras including a commentary. However, it you are on a budget you do have other options. So make some popcorn and enjoy the show. Thanks, CAL

"I'm not taking vows. I just play the organ.":
Carnival of Souls is the horror movie Albert Camus might have made. It's a lot like George Romero's original Night of the Living Dead - - black and white, low-budget, a simple horror story that's really about human beings' isolation in their own skins. The acting ensemble in Romero's film is consistently better, but Carnival of Souls only has one real character, and Candace Hilligoss as Mary is very good. It's probably only her performance that has kept this movie around for over forty years. It's 1962 in a small town, and two young guys in a hot rod and three young women in another car are drag racing. They get to the bridge outside of town, finally going fast enough to feel alive when . . . . . . Mary crawls out of the river, covered in mud, the only female survivor. The other two girls paid the price for giving in to the thrill of the boys' challenge. Seemingly unaffected (almost in the clinical sense of being without affect), Mary follows her plan to go to another small town where she's been hired as a church organist. She doesn't believe in the church, though; she's a musician and playing the organ is just a job. Mary's drive to her new town is the scariest bit of filmmaking I've seen in a long time. Trying to settle into her new life, Mary starts to crack up. Besides seeing an apparition connected to an old ruined carnival, Mary is suddenly unable to hear the people around her. Three men say they want to help her - - a would-be boyfriend who's only interested in sex and leaves her when she lets her despair show, a doctor who violently shakes her and orders her to his office for his expert help, and the minister she works for who fires her when something possesses her and she "profanes" his church with carnival music. Love, science, and God all fail her. If Mary had only been able to hang on for five or ten years, maybe she would have found more satisfying work, or support from other women, or been stronger herself. In 1962 Mary felt the nothingness eating her alive, but she couldn't see a way out in time. She lost the race.

crap:
It sounds cheap. It looks cheap. There was nothing scary or entertaining about it. The plot doesn't make sense. People talk to her, everything blurs then they don't see or hear her. Dumb. I had to force myself and my friends to watch it. I love old horror films but this one was a dud. I don't understand the reviews saying how great this movie is. Don't waste your money.

Not since The Shining has a film created such a primal sense of fear & foreboding:
When I saw a copy of Carnival of Souls together with Night of the Living Dead for a measly buck, I figured I would go ahead and take advantage. After all, I could always use a backup copy of Night of the Living Dead, and this Carnival of Souls looked good for laughs. So I bought the set, having a bit of change on me, and that night I readied myself for some fun. When I put Carnival of Souls into the player, I was at first a bit unimpressed. I mean, nothing really happened that related to any sort of plot. Then, about 25 minutes into the film I started feeling very uneasy, a feeling I was unfamiliar with in film with the exception of Stanley Kubrick's 'The Shining'. the story is simple, to put it short a woman survives a car accident, and delves into a dissolute surrealistic nightmare. The surreal atmosphere, the sudden realizations of fear, and the general feel of the film gave a VERY foreboding atmosphere, which haunted me the entire following week. The film is just so foreboding, I could not help but remain uneasy, even the second time around. The film also was also fairly technically impressive, at least more so then I thought. This film had come six years before George A. Romero's Night of the Living Dead, but the use of camera is very similar, and it is very evident that Romero has been influenced by this film's direction. It is a shame that Herk Harvey did not expand on his talent, this is his only feature, yet there is nothing amateur about it. It is very advanced considering what it is, and I was overtly impressed with it. I suppose Carnival of Souls could, and maybe should warrant an 8/10, I gave it 7/10, but it is truly an original film, and one that I feel holds up very well in the present day. I think it is a must see for fans of surrealism, horror, or just experiences.

In and around itself, it was creepy...:
Okay, well, if you've read the title you basically know what I'm going to start out with. I think I've watched this movie the equivalent of 40 times, and each time I see the opening title, terror runs through my spine. Why? Because this movie doesn't have to have anything happen, and it's creepy. Eerie. I mean, the music, the actors, the setting, everything makes this movie creepy, and the only shocking thing was the man with eye-makeup. I could watch this movie 100 times and still be apprehensive about turning off the light at night... it's just the atmosphere of this movie! Anyone & everyone, please 'add to cart' right now! I am telling you that you won't regret it!