31 Nights of Halloween Horror - Carnival of Souls

Carnival of Souls
78 mins.
Dir. Herk Harvey
1962/USA


Another classic that has influenced many.  Haunting and eerie, the Criterion Blu Ray is so crisp and clear it is like watching the movie again for the first time.  And in case this is your first time...

Mary and two of her friends are driving in a car when two guys pull up and challenge them to a drag race.  It seems like a good idea until they go over a narrow bridge and the girl's car is run off the edge, plummeting into the river below.  The river is dredged, but they find nothing.  A little later Mary miraculously comes walking out of the river.  She feels she has had enough of dull Kansas and takes a job as a church organist in the exciting state of Utah.  While driving out she passes an old run-down pavilion that she seems drawn to.  She keeps seeing ghostly figures in her car window, on the road, in her boarding house, etc.   Eventually she feels like she is starting to blink out of existence.  All goes silent as if she is invisible to everyone around her and then snaps back to reality.  Is this all a dream or something more.  Mary thinks the answers like within the abandoned pavilion on the side of the road and is compelled to go to find out.


Stark black and white, this one almost plays like a twilight zone episode.  Truly haunting both visually and in storytelling, accompanied throughout by disorienting organ music.  And if that is not enough, add in the ghostly ghouls who haunt Mary, almost beckoning her to join them.  Their pasty cracked white make-up and dark eyes, while simple are very effective.  The scene of these ghouls ball dancing around in the abandoned pavilion is a stand out nightmare inducing scene.

An influencer to Night of the Living Dead, Carnival of Souls bring ghouls and ghosts out of the castle and into modern day.  While mostly unheard of back in it's day, thankfully this movie got a resurgence in the late 80s and got re-discovered for the classic it has become.  A black and white favorite of mine and the Criterion Blu Ray really escalates this movie to a work of art.



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