The Rage: Carrie 2

There may not be too much to read into the title that has Carrie 2 almost as an afterthought. Had it been Carrie 2: The Rage the impression might have been that a lot more came out of the ground in the original.

It would detract from what is not a bad film in its own right. It doesn’t go too far from the originals premise of an outsider with difficulties. Fostered from an early age Rachel Lang (Emily Bergl) after her mother suffers a mental breakdown, she is pretty much an outsider.

It’s the usual thing of high school jocks and bitchy women looking for status. Rachel doesn’t chime with that but is over the moon for her best friend Lisa (Mena Suvari) who has had a liaison with one of said jocks. It goes terribly and tragically wrong as it comes out that the jocks are keeping a score list of conquests.

What follows is pretty much along the lines of the original (including snippets) plus bringing in Sue Snell (Amy Irving) one of the survivors from the Carrie’s prom night conflagration. Snell starts to suspect that Rachel is developing similar powers and actually takes her to the ruins of the hall that has never been demolished. She starts to investigate further and these turn up information that confirm her fears.

So, we have one of the jocks the incredibly boring Jesse (Jason London) getting friendly with Rachel, finding that he is really starting to like her. Meanwhile jock and the Heathers wannabees plot against Rachel and from there it is pretty much home sailing though in a different location.

There’s a bit a of a lack imagination here as the film follows that original far too closely in some respects. It does try to push a little further with the ideas around college hierarchy and how Rachel gets her powers and why they are the same as Carrie’s though a bit predictable. But it’s the full-blown tear ‘em up ending that we are looking for and Katt Shea delivers on that very well.

The release features a good audio commentary with Kat Shea, an alternate ending plus deleted scenes.