Carnival Of Souls
1962
The Cast
This is one strange little weird film, which balances between the brilliant and the awful. Though this is listed as a Horror flick it's more like a Dark Fantasy as there's no real horror here.
I really liked the story. A girl, Mary (Hilligoss), involved in a fatal drag race is the sole survivor of the accident where the car she's travelling in crashes off a bridge... only she emerges from the river, a long time after the accident. After her recovery, she leaves the town to take up a new job as a church organist. However, there's a strange force lurking in her new home and it's quite shortly after she begins to believe she was surely drawn there... for some dark reason.
What makes this a great movie is the direction. Though the majority of the film is shot in a fairly standard style, it's when the apparitions start to appear where it starts to get interesting. Herk Harvey does a good job of creating an eerie atmosphere. His style had me reminiscing about Nosferatu and The Cabinet Of Dr Caligari. Even the way that the spirits move and act is very striking. They never speak and they actually move in a similar fashion to actors in the old silent movies. This has the element of adding a strangeness to the scene and it works well.
Then there's the story. I particularly liked the scene where Mary walks around the abandoned carnival. There's one section where she looks at and stands in front of a billboard... the woman on the add bears a striking resemblance to Mary. This adds to the strange atmosphere, which makes the film stronger.
The only real drawback is the lead actress Candace Hilligoss who is so over the top hammy she quite nearly kills the film by herself. This type of acting works brilliantly for the spirits and adds to the power of the movie. However, in reality, where everybody else is normal this appears very poor. It's a shame that she's in the majority of the film. Had this role been given to a finer actress or she had been directed better this movie would have been so much improved.
If you've not seen this one yet then I'd recommend you check it out. I'd also implore you to check out Nosferatu and The Cabinet Of Dr Caligari also. If you liked this film you would love them.
I give this a Darkly Pleasing And An Eerily Spooky 5.75 out of 10.
