Carnival of Souls (1962)
Starring Candace Hilligoss. Directed by Herk Harvey.
Kilgore rates it: 4 (out of 10)

Carnival of Souls is a cult classic. Cult classic is a code phrase meaning "bad movie that nobody watched when it first came out, and nobody really watches it now, (because it's a bad movie, remember?), except for a handful of pathetic people who desperately seek something, anything to latch onto to make their barren, empty, involutarily celibate lives seem livable for two hours or so, and for some reason these people always corner you at parties and trap you in unspeakably boring conversations about things that no person with a life worth living could ever possibly care about, for example: the cult classic Carnival of Souls."

Carnival of Souls is a low-budget horror film about a woman who gets haunted by dead people at random intervals, and might be dead herself, or maybe not, or something. It's hard to pinpoint exactly what's going on, because the plot is so muddy and convoluted. The movie's pace slows to a crawl at times, making it seem interminable even though it's only 78 minutes long, and the acting is spotty and awkward at best. On the plus side, Candace Hilligoss -- the lead actress -- is a very beautiful woman, and the organ music score is hauntingly effective. Also, some of the scenes were genuinely creepy, especially the shots of the ballroom-dancing zombies.

+posted by Lawrence @ 12/21/2003 11:28:00 PM