Carnival of Souls (1962)Having grit means persevering toward a goal, no matter the hurdles along the way. I'd like to think that this was what filmmaker Herk Harvey was thinking as he made his ultra-low budget ghost story, Carnival of Souls (1962), which was reportedly inspired by everything from the "art films" of Ingmar Bergman and Jean Cocteau to an abandoned Saltair Pavilion in Utah that looms in the background until the film's climax. Released by Centron Corporation--known for educational films, the kind which Harvey cut his teeth on--the need for more creative flexibility must have been too much for Harvey to ignore, leading to the creation of this perennial midnight movie turned cult classic.
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Independent filmmaking has always fascinated me. I've always been drawn to the idea of enterprising filmmakers shirking the suffocating studio system to forge one's own path to self-expression. But like any venture, independent filmmaking carries risks, both financial and creative, and Carnival of Souls suffers on both fronts. You have to hand it to Harvey, though, for following through with the idea of making a horror movie that relies more on atmosphere than jump scares, inspired by the then-contemporary styles of European filmmakers. It's the kind of pet project that only a true film buff would want to undertake, even if Harvey's capacity for delivering a quality horror film could only reach so high. I want to be generous here, because I believe that creators need to stumble before they can produce quality work. This is true for many filmmakers--just look at Stanley Kubrick's Fear and Desire (although I'm sure he'd rather that you didn't). Made on a budget of just over thirty thousand dollars, Harvey apparently raised the initial seventeen thousand by going to local businesses to finance the production, hat in hand. It's evident that little to none of the budget was spent on the majority of the actors. If you told me that they were locals hired to read lines, I would believe you. There is, however, Candace Hilligoss, who plays the protagonist of Carnival of Souls, the aloof church organist-for-hire, Mary Henry. Reportedly trained by Lee Strasberg, it's important to remember that at the tender age of twenty, Hilligoss perhaps would have benefited from more life experience in order to add depth to her performance--and hers is the best of the batch, such as it is. I've seen independent films made fon shoestring budgets like this one, ranging from John Cassavetes' formative Shadows to Shane Carruth's nuanced and hypnotic Primer, and even the surprisingly effective splatter horror film, Terrifier, by Damien Leone. And then, you also have to recall other cheapo horror flicks like those by the maestro of bad movies, Ed Wood, including the infamous Plan 9 from Outer Space. Carnival of Souls falls somewhere in between, regrettably leaning more toward camp than quality.
Carnival of Souls starts out fast, with an unlikely drag race that ends in one of the cars--the one that Mary is a passenger of--going over the rails of a bridge, lost to the river below. Given that the way that the river is depicted could hardly be called vast, it begs the question as to why the car could not be recovered, except to justify the film's plot. Mary emerges from the waters hours after the crash, alive yet confused as to how she got there. Cut away to her testing out a massive church organ--which serves double as the film's musical score--and she explains that she is headed for Utah for a job to play a church organ, cryptically adding that she's never coming back. She makes a point of emphasizing that she doesn't believe that her lack of faith should affect her career path--an attitude which flummoxes all of the men she shares this with, owing perhaps to the era and the setting. Of course her unspoken skepticism of the supernatural is destined to be shattered as she begins seeing phantasms of a ghoulish man--played by Harvey himself--in reflective surfaces and in increasingly tangible hallucinations. For those who may not have figured it out from the first few minutes of Carnival of Souls, Mary is dead...she just doesn't know it yet, nor does anyone else, apparently. And if this sounds reminiscent of the deliciously chilling episode of "The Twilight Zone" titled "The Hitch-Hiker", it's worth mentioning that Carnival of Souls was made a couple of years after this; perhaps Harvey missed that episode? Yes, this movie was reportedly adapted (very loosely) from a short story by Ambrose Bierce titled "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" written in 1890, but the fact remains that Carnival of Souls is just too darned similar to "The Hitch-Hiker"--or even the short French film of the same name as the short story made a year earlier--for it to be just a coincidence. Plagiarism? Probably not, but it becomes a little harder to defend this all too roughshod film without acknowledging that it feels like a cheap knockoff, capitalizing on the success of better works. In this, interestingly enough, Carnival of Souls still remains relevant, if only as a historical oddity. How many modern horror classics are plagued by lousy imitators riding on its coattails, because any cheap horror movie still tends to be highly profitable? Carnival of Souls was made in about three weeks, with the cast and crew working every day, employing "guerrilla filmmaking" techniques--such as shooting on actual locations without a permit--to get the film done in time. It's bold and exciting, but such a move rarely comes without jeopardizing quality. Sometimes this is done to invoke a cinéma vérité style of filmmaking, but here it is simply a necessary evil. There is something that will always be unsettling about abandoned buildings, especially those like the Saltair Pavilion, which looks like a palace out in the middle of nowhere. But sometimes, it just isn't enough to be inspired to make art. You have to put in the hard work, be patient, and especially be willing to admit when something isn't working. One wonders just how much better Carnival of Souls could have been if only Harvey had these resources at his disposal?
Recommended for: Fans of low-budget cinematic relics that offer more as a historical novelty than true entertainment. Carnival of Souls may have survived as a cult classic, but its value as an enjoyable horror movie is dubious at best, with consistently bad acting and a story so predictable and uninspired, you'd need to check your own pulse if you haven't figured it out after the first ten minutes.
Carnival of Souls starts out fast, with an unlikely drag race that ends in one of the cars--the one that Mary is a passenger of--going over the rails of a bridge, lost to the river below. Given that the way that the river is depicted could hardly be called vast, it begs the question as to why the car could not be recovered, except to justify the film's plot. Mary emerges from the waters hours after the crash, alive yet confused as to how she got there. Cut away to her testing out a massive church organ--which serves double as the film's musical score--and she explains that she is headed for Utah for a job to play a church organ, cryptically adding that she's never coming back. She makes a point of emphasizing that she doesn't believe that her lack of faith should affect her career path--an attitude which flummoxes all of the men she shares this with, owing perhaps to the era and the setting. Of course her unspoken skepticism of the supernatural is destined to be shattered as she begins seeing phantasms of a ghoulish man--played by Harvey himself--in reflective surfaces and in increasingly tangible hallucinations. For those who may not have figured it out from the first few minutes of Carnival of Souls, Mary is dead...she just doesn't know it yet, nor does anyone else, apparently. And if this sounds reminiscent of the deliciously chilling episode of "The Twilight Zone" titled "The Hitch-Hiker", it's worth mentioning that Carnival of Souls was made a couple of years after this; perhaps Harvey missed that episode? Yes, this movie was reportedly adapted (very loosely) from a short story by Ambrose Bierce titled "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" written in 1890, but the fact remains that Carnival of Souls is just too darned similar to "The Hitch-Hiker"--or even the short French film of the same name as the short story made a year earlier--for it to be just a coincidence. Plagiarism? Probably not, but it becomes a little harder to defend this all too roughshod film without acknowledging that it feels like a cheap knockoff, capitalizing on the success of better works. In this, interestingly enough, Carnival of Souls still remains relevant, if only as a historical oddity. How many modern horror classics are plagued by lousy imitators riding on its coattails, because any cheap horror movie still tends to be highly profitable? Carnival of Souls was made in about three weeks, with the cast and crew working every day, employing "guerrilla filmmaking" techniques--such as shooting on actual locations without a permit--to get the film done in time. It's bold and exciting, but such a move rarely comes without jeopardizing quality. Sometimes this is done to invoke a cinéma vérité style of filmmaking, but here it is simply a necessary evil. There is something that will always be unsettling about abandoned buildings, especially those like the Saltair Pavilion, which looks like a palace out in the middle of nowhere. But sometimes, it just isn't enough to be inspired to make art. You have to put in the hard work, be patient, and especially be willing to admit when something isn't working. One wonders just how much better Carnival of Souls could have been if only Harvey had these resources at his disposal?
Recommended for: Fans of low-budget cinematic relics that offer more as a historical novelty than true entertainment. Carnival of Souls may have survived as a cult classic, but its value as an enjoyable horror movie is dubious at best, with consistently bad acting and a story so predictable and uninspired, you'd need to check your own pulse if you haven't figured it out after the first ten minutes.