Of all the remakes, reboots, and reimaginings in the works, the one we have the least animosity towards is probably “Boys Don’t Cry” director Kimberly Peirce’s upcoming remake of “Carrie.” Sure, Brian De Palma already turned author Stephen King’s twisted tale – of a girl with telekinetic powers who is abused by her own fundamentalist mother and her high school peers, all leading to one horrifying night at prom – into a classic film, but this new version shows promise. Peirce has lined up some great talent in “Hugo” lead Chloe Grace Moretz for the role of Carrie, and the always excellent Julianne Moore taking over the role of her mother Margaret White. Now it appears that Moretz is looking to put even more distance between the upcoming adaptation and De Palma's 1976 movie.
At Vanity Fair’s “Face of the Future” event honoring the young star, Moretz spoke of her aspirations for the project, adding that she will be “changing everything about me—my hair, my look." It’ll be hard to imagine the 15-year-old brunette going for a more Gothic persona, even though she proved she could have a darker side in “Let Me In” and even “Dark Shadows” – she adds that, “I’m doing my own take on [the character]. The script is totally different from the [original]. It’s more like the book. It’s a more 'Black Swan' version—it messes with your mind. You’ll see things, and you don’t know if you’ve seen them.” While “it’s more like the book” is a popular phrase for anyone to utter who’s working on a remake, we could see how Peirce and company would want to aim for a different take on the story and character. After all, the tale could certainly use a modern update – even if we didn’t exactly NEED one – and going for something a bit more psychological in nature could yield some interesting results.
Filming is set to begin in the fall, with a March 15, 2013 release date already set. It’ll be interesting to see what route Pierce takes with this film – whether it’ll pander to the kiddies or be a little more mature genre fare – and we suppose we’ll have a good idea when the MPAA slaps this with a rating (a PG-13 would be pretty telling).
