31 Days of Halloween, Day 16- Carnival of Souls (1962)

Bing! Bing! Bing! We have a winner! Astranger was able to guess today’s feature and in one go no less! Though Critters and Attic Expeditions were also great guesses. Your third guesses are consistently films I haven’t heard of yet. I forgot to mention, y’all are disqualified if you use AI. You can look shit up, just turn that AI filter off first. Alright, where do you go for Pumpkin Spice Lattes in NC stranger? I’ll give ‘em a call in the morning and make sure they got one set aside for you.

Directed By: Herk Harvey

MVP’s: Candace Hilligoss, Sidney Berger, Frances Feist, Stan Levitt, Art Ellison, Herk Harvey, Steve Boozer, T.C. Andrews

Plot: Mary Henry just wants to leave a troubled past behind her and start fresh as the church organist in Salt Lake City. But darn it if she don’t keep seeing ghouls! If she don’t keep blipping out of reality. If she’s not compelled to visit that spooky old abandoned carnival.

Response: Mrs. Tauman says she “ain’t one to make a fuss about a thing like that.” All the real people faces of Kansas City. Horny bro neighbors looking to add you to their conquests. I’d take my chances with the ghouls!

Review: This one’s a smartie with style and elegance to spare! A total treat in the Twilight Zone vein.

It’s late and I’m inarticulate but there’s something interesting here about the patriarchal figures that seek to “help” her. One’s a minister and the other a shrink.

Sidney Berger plays an all time great sleaze.

Totally ahead of it’s time. Like zombies doing ballroom dancing is the kinda artsy flair that the best A24ists are tryna pull off today.

There’s also so much late 60’s Kansas on display and filmed so gorgeously, it’s a real treat.

This is top tier Halloween movie picking y’all. A great companion piece to our Day 5 film, Let’s Scare Jessica to Death.

And don’t get my started on the original organ score. *Chef’s kiss*

Background: Herk Harvey was a Navy vet turned theatre director. His career was filming and directing educational and industrial films and videos for classroom education, job training and government agencies. The company that he worked for that produced these videos was Centron Corporation. Some of those, like Shake Hands with Danger have gone on to get fame in and of themselves. But this was his sole, artistic and creative narrative feature (not educational or training).

He went big though, raising modest funds, employing the Lee Strassberg trained Hilligoss and saying he wanted to make a Bergman movie with the feel of Cocteau. Just awesome. It’s a shame he didn’t make more.

Halloween Score:

Autumn Vibes: 4/5

Scares & Chills: 3/5

Cultural & Cinematic Importance: 5/5

Monster Action: 2/5

Can Kids Watch It? Totally. Maybe 8 +? There’s not a lot of upsetting images but a lot of great juicy dread.

Where to Peep? It’s on Max as well as Criterion in nice high def and Criterion was where I peeped it. But if you don’t have and don’t want a subscription, I’d still say it’s worth trying to check out the Criterion DVD from your public library. But for right now viewing I’d recommend it on Plutotv, some of the picture might be cut off and the video and audio aren’t the sharpest but it beats the colorized versions on the other free streamers.

Hint for Tomorrow’s Movie:

It’s a weird slasher. A cult classic with alotta DIY spunk and spirit.

Left to Right and Top to Bottom: original Poster, Jasper doodle, Danish poster, Japanese poster, Criterion cover, and rad home video art