Hi!
This recent video from Laci Green tickled my fancy a bit. I think there’s an area of my brain that starts flashing when I see feminism, critical theory, and horror combined. It goes a little like this:
yes, yes, YES!
Anyway…
The part about Carrie interested me particularly. Now, it’s been a while since I’ve seen the movie, (and I’ve yet to read the book; it’s on the list) but I’ve always found it so weird that the mother was personally offended that Carrie had begun menstruating.
“Like-…uh WHAT?!”
Obviously that’s absurd, but when I started to think about it again while listening to Laci quote Steven King and give her own interpretation, I’m thinking okay, so the reason that Carries mother is reacting so strongly to her daughter’s period is because she is threatened by it? And her classmate’s reactions could be viewed similarly.
And fast-forward to the end (for those of us who grew up using VCRs)…
And we have the iconic scene where Carrie is covered in the pigs blood, and to the unobservant viewer, this is a meant to be an act of humiliation, but of course this is the scene where Carrie really ‘comes into her own’, while covered in blood. Blood, which could be taken again as a symbol of her female-ness.
That’s all my thoughts on this for now.