“Carrie” made in 2013, is a remake of the classic 1976 thriller, which was based on the Stephen King novel published in 1974. As a person who has seen both of them, I can conclude that the new Carrie is not quite as thrilling as it could have been. It obviously had more special effects and better quality and, of course, better acting. This movie did not thrill, however, as much as it could have done with its newfound special effects. It appealed to me more emotionally as they displayed Carrie’s story much better in this version of the film. The scene in the beginning of the movie was of Carrie’s mother giving birth to her in a bedroom. As the scene continues and the baby is born, Carrie’s mother, played by Julianne Moore who did the part justice, takes out a pair of scissors as if to kill the baby but cannot proceed to do so. This was smart on the part of the directors, considering it shows a little more of Carrie’s backstory and how harsh her life and mother truly were, making her snap.

This is also the age of technology, so the directors did a fantastic job of incorporating this into the movie. In fact, a good portion of the movie is based on a video taken on a student’s phone. During one scene, Carrie gets her first period in front of the entire girl’s locker room. Of course, considering how terrible these girls truly were, they threw feminine products at her screaming “Plug it up!” As this was happening, one of the girls was taking a video on her iPhone. This was an excellent interpretation of modern technology; all over the internet you see videos of people falling or getting hurt or embarrassed that people took with their phone. This form of technology helps make bullying worse than ever, such as in Carrie’s case. The director’s included technology well throughout the entire movie.

In another scene in the movie, one of the main female characters, Kris, was suspended to where she could not go to prom. She then lied to her father and told him that she never did anything to Carrie and that she was not the one who took the video. Her father asked her to hand over her phone to the principal if she was really telling the truth yet she refused and ran off. This is also an accurate representation of technology in the modern age, as the phone can provide more information than you could get out of one person otherwise.

Around the middle of the movie, another of the main female characters, Sue, feels terrible about what she did to Carrie and wants to make it up to her; in order to do so she asks her boyfriend to take Carrie to the prom instead of herself to make Carrie feel included. This showed that there is still kindness in the world, giving off a nice message even in this thriller.

The entire movie, however, is more focused on the fact that Carrie can move things with her mind, a power called telekinesis. In little scenes throughout the movie, you will see things break when Carrie gets upset or mad. This is just foreshadowing for the humongous incident that occurs at the end of the movie. Once Carrie discovers that she actually has these powers, she decides to start to learn how to use them. She gets books and watches videos, which is another use of technology that was not included in the original version of this movie. However, her mother – an radical when it comes to religion – believed that Carrie’s gift was from the devil. Her mother found out about Carrie’s gift when Carrie was asked to prom by Tommy, Sue’s boyfriend, and Carrie’s mother told Carrie that she was not allowed to go to the prom because all boys had terrible intentions and she had been “taken” by Carrie’s father.

This was where the special effects came in; Carrie then lifts her mother up using just her mind and hands without physically touching her mother. She tells her mother about her gift and tells her that she is going to the prom.

The scene changes then to night, and Kris, who believes that Carrie is to blame for her suspension, goes to a farm with her boyfriend. They decide to kill a pig and put its blood into a bucket to dump on Carrie’s head when she is crowned Prom Queen. This scene was much better than the version from the 1976 version because it was slightly more gruesome, which is normal for horror movies these days, and because the quality of the scene was better so you could better see what was truly happening during the scene.

On the night of the prom, Carrie is getting ready as her mother is pleading with her not to go. She keeps telling her to go to her “closet to pray.” Carrie gets angry at her mother and eventually throws her mother into the closet with her mind and burns the lock, so that her mother cannot come after her. Carrie then leaves for the prom while her mother bangs on the door. Her mother believed that hurting herself would make Carrie listen but the directors did a great job during this scene showing Carrie’s beginning of defiance.

As she arrives at the prom, she is greeted by many people who are actually socializing with her and making her feel welcome. We can see how Carrie is changing during this scene as she is actually happy and smiling; this was the first time in the whole movie when she looked truly happy. Her date, Tommy, then dances with her and invites her somewhere after prom, making her feel even more accepted. During the voting time however, the girl that was in charge of the ballots, a friend of Kris’s, changed all the votes so that Carrie and Tommy would win.

They, of course, won and they went up on stage and accepted their crown and tiara. As this happened, Sue had arrived because she had been tipped off my Kris that something bad was going to happen. She tried to stop it from happening but the gym teacher who was trying to help Carrie though Sue was trying to ruin the moment for Carrie and kicked her out. This proved to be a fatal mistake.

Just as Sue was locked out, Kris, who was above the stage, pulled the rope and caused the bucket to spill blood all over Carrie. The entire room goes silent and watches as Carrie stands there on stage shocked. Carrie becomes angry and starts to use her telekinesis, accidentally knocking Tommy unconscious in the process, only making her angrier. She begins to throw pieces of wood and chairs at people, targeting her attackers and others who have made fun of her. The special effects in this scene were amazing; they were so much better than the original. There were electrical cords that were shocking girls and bleachers moving on top of people. The way that everything moved looked extremely realistic, unlike the version from 1976.

After her rampage at the prom, Carrie goes after Kris and her boyfriend; they are trying to leave town in a car, but Carrie breaks the road so that they cannot go any further. The special effects in this scene also were amazing, as the road appeared to be actually breaking apart. The two people in the car decided to run Carrie over but were stopped by Carrie as she used her mind to push the front of the car back into the car, killing the boyfriend. In order to kill Kris, she lifts the back end the car and uses her mind to push the gas pedal sending the car flying into a gas station. This use of special effects and explosions attracts audiences, making people feel thrilled while also relieved that the bad person is out of the picture.

In the next to last scene of the movie, Carrie goes home to her mother who has escaped the closet. Her mother pretends to be caring and holds her, but then tries to kill Carrie by stabbing her with a knife in the back. Carrie then uses her mind powers to get into a fight with her mother and ends up killing her mother by throwing knives and scissors at her.

Sue then comes into the home and tries to help Carrie, but Carrie is distraught because she killed her mother. She then uses her mind to tell Sue that Sue is pregnant with a girl then uses her telekinesis to send Sue out of the house. The house tumbles down, bit by bit, with amazing special effects again, sending the house into the ground with Carrie and her mother still inside. This was extremely interesting and was an edge-of-your-seat moment, as you did not know if Carrie or Sue was going to escape.

At the very end of the movie, we see Sue visiting Carrie’s grave to put a flower, however people have put graffiti all over the headstone. Sue places the flower anyway and walks away. As she walks away the headstone starts to break and explode, foreshadowing that Carrie might possibly not be dead yet.

This movie was better in some ways, yet worse in some way than the 1976 version because obviously the special effects were better and the use of technology appealed to younger audiences. However, too many special effects may have been the cause of less thrill, which is what people really came to see in the first place. The movie was supposed to be a thriller, yet lacked the needed thrills. If they could have done anything better, just a few less special effects would have made the thrills that much better.