JК
Danse Macabre :: Кинг Стивен
Страница: 151 из 359In writing the novel, I found myself slogging grimly toward the conclusion, trying to do the best job I could with what I knew about women (which was not a great deal). The strain shows in the finished book. It's a fast and entertaining read, I think, and (for me at least) quite gripping. But there's a certain heaviness there that a really good popular novel sshould not have, a feeling of Sturm and Drang that I could not get rid of no matter how hard I tried. The book seems clear enough and truthful enough in terms of the characters and their actions, but it lacks the style of De Palma's film.
The book attempts to look at the ant farm of high school society dead on; De Palma's examination of this High School Confidential world is more oblique . . . and more cutting. The film came along at a time when movie critics were bewailing the fact that there were no movies being made with good, meaty roles for women in them . . . but none of these critics seem to have noticed that in its film incarnation, Carrie belongs almost entirely to the ladies. Billy Nolan, a major-and frightening-character in the book, has been reduced to a semisupporting role in the movie. Tommy, the boy who takes Carrie to the Prom, is presented in the novel as a boy who is honestly trying to do something manly-in his own way he is trying to opt out of the caste system. In the film he becomes little more than his girlfriend's cat's-paw, her tool of atonement for her part in the shower room scene where Carrie is pelted with sanitary napkins.
"I don't go around with anyone I don't want to," Tommy said patiently. "I'm asking because I want to ask you." Ultimately, he knew this to be the truth.
In the film, however, when Carrie asks Tommy why he is favoring her with an invitation to the Prom, he offers her a dizzy sun 'n' surf grin and says, "Because you liked my poem.” Which, by the way, his girlfriend wrote.
The novel views high school in a fairly common way: as that pit of man- and woman-eaters already mentioned. De Palma's social stance is more original; he sees this suburban white kids' high school as a kind of matriarchy. No matter where you look, there are girls behind the scenes, pulling invisible wires, rigging elections, using their boyfriends as stalking horses.
Against such a backdrop, Carrie becomes doubly pitiful, because she is unable to do any of these things-she can only wait to be saved or damned by the actions of others. Her only power is her telekinetic ability, and both book and movie eventually arrive at the same point: Carrie uses her "wild talent" to pull down the whole rotten society.
The book attempts to look at the ant farm of high school society dead on; De Palma's examination of this High School Confidential world is more oblique . . . and more cutting. The film came along at a time when movie critics were bewailing the fact that there were no movies being made with good, meaty roles for women in them . . . but none of these critics seem to have noticed that in its film incarnation, Carrie belongs almost entirely to the ladies. Billy Nolan, a major-and frightening-character in the book, has been reduced to a semisupporting role in the movie. Tommy, the boy who takes Carrie to the Prom, is presented in the novel as a boy who is honestly trying to do something manly-in his own way he is trying to opt out of the caste system. In the film he becomes little more than his girlfriend's cat's-paw, her tool of atonement for her part in the shower room scene where Carrie is pelted with sanitary napkins.
"I don't go around with anyone I don't want to," Tommy said patiently. "I'm asking because I want to ask you." Ultimately, he knew this to be the truth.
In the film, however, when Carrie asks Tommy why he is favoring her with an invitation to the Prom, he offers her a dizzy sun 'n' surf grin and says, "Because you liked my poem.” Which, by the way, his girlfriend wrote.
The novel views high school in a fairly common way: as that pit of man- and woman-eaters already mentioned. De Palma's social stance is more original; he sees this suburban white kids' high school as a kind of matriarchy. No matter where you look, there are girls behind the scenes, pulling invisible wires, rigging elections, using their boyfriends as stalking horses.
Against such a backdrop, Carrie becomes doubly pitiful, because she is unable to do any of these things-she can only wait to be saved or damned by the actions of others. Her only power is her telekinetic ability, and both book and movie eventually arrive at the same point: Carrie uses her "wild talent" to pull down the whole rotten society.