Tanz der toten Seelen

I have just seen this movie for the second time and love it twice as much. The great thing about it is that it's quiet and dreamlike and there's absolutely no blood or gore or real violence. And it's in black and white-you can't beat that! I assume you all know the story very well, a story I find to be most intriguing and not at all as predictable and plain as everyone makes it out to be. Mary Henry and her friends sail off a bridge, although Mary is mysteriously unscathed. After that, while dealing with her job as a church organist and various other characters, she is pursued by a devilishly delicious zombie and goes through periods of complete estrangement from the world. And then of course there's her neighbor Mr. Linden. He's so greasy and sex-crazed that I couldn't help but love him, and he makes an excellent contrast against Candace Hilligoss's solitary, quiet character. Their scenes together are eerie just on their own(Linden spying on a changing Mary and the attempted-necking scene infront of the mirror) Mary is also drawn toward an old pavillion where her eventual end takes place, and that too is eerie. Her periods of silence are probably the creepiest of the movie, almost claustrophobic and especially dreadful. I mean-who wants to be in broad daylight and feel like they're the last person on earth while practically going deaf? All in all, let's just put it this way. I'm an old movie guru, so this is obviously going to pertain to me more than The Sixth Sense and all those other gore fests, and even so, you can't help but love this movie. I'll be treasuring it for a long time.

Not many people know of this film, surprisingly--this is one of the most intelligently constructed and atmospheric horror (for lack of a better term) movies of all time. Whenever I do run across someone else who has seen this film, there is an instantaneous, unspoken understanding in regards to the enduring creepiness of this film.

My first viewing of COS occurred when I had inexplicably awoke in the middle of the night as a boy and switched on the TV. I had missed the opening minutes, but was powerfully drawn into the story. I sat transfixed until the shock ending, and think I just stared until after the sign off and following screen static. The next day I was not entirely sure I had actually watched this film or dreamed it--nobody else had ever heard of it and I never did catch the title (for some reason, its never shown much). Needless to say I was creeped out for days! Films that can affect one's sensibilities like this are golden! Find it and watch it in the middle of the night--alone.

This film of Herk Harvey is a gem of cult, a unique product, considering that the director never would film again due to the commercial failure of this prime opera. A true pity, since from the titles we are in front of an absolutely original and punctilious piece of work, as much in the aesthetic aspect as in casting and the production. A calm little town as many in the average American west, in the early ' 60s. A race cars between boys and girls that finishes in tragedy. The car of the young people falls from a bridge to the river and apparently all suffocates. But Mary Henry leaves the water. Later she obtains a solitary job as an organist in the church of a near town. Her life seems to take control again , when Mary begins to have strange visions of macabre figures... but her will is put under taste more .Mary is a cold of great clear eyes, independent and distant blonde; . In fact, the personage of Mary is few years subsequent to the one of the blondes of Psychosis and Vertigo, even a doctor appears who does the times of psychiatrist, who resembles films of the great British director again. and three years previous to the one of Catherine Deneuve in Repulsion, of Polanski;(the personal style of the film it just remains me o a Polanski film,I wonder if he saw this movie) been compared to Wild Strawberries-era Ingmar Bergman and the dreamstates of Jean Cocteau. Nevertheless, the carnival of the souls has with all these titles a great climate affinity and characters; . I cannot say more; The carnival of the souls is dream like, hypnotic, frightful per moments, always disquieting is a total experience. Notice the ballroom scene of the macabre people(In fast motion). Shot on location in and around the spectacular Saltair pavilion (since destroyed by fire), and the soundtrack is pretty creepy too.

This strangely, hypnotic film has been in the back of my mind since I was a kid, and I can't even remember where I first saw it. Images have stuck with me - the floating fingers on the organ, Mr. Linden the creepy neighbor in the boarding house, the ghostly amusement park, and all of the bizarre characters this young woman comes in contact with during her journey of discovery.

The lead actress seemed like an amateur, which made her all the more realistic in the long run. What happened to Mr. Harvey? Anyone who has viewed this one is not likely to forget it. The music, cinematography, and sound were right on the money. A bizarre journey for anyone who can find it. A 7 out of 10.

After viewing this legendary flick for the first time, I have to say that the quality they achieved on a shoestring is still impressive today. Every penny spent on this little film makes its way before the viewer, which is something that can't be said of most major budget films then or now. Corman used "getting the money up on the screen" as his yardstick for his own success as low budget producer and director. But while I like the Corman cheapies, like Bucket of Blood and Little Shop of Horrors, and acknowledge that they possess a relatively high level of workman-like resourcefulness, it's hard to deny that Carnival makes many of Corman's films look slapped-out and unimaginative in comparison. Corman usually steered clear of anything poetic, dabbling with it most pointedly in the dream sequences in his first Poe adaptations. In contrast, this films makers are quoted to the effect that they were inspired by Bergman and Cocteau. Now, with such heroic ambition, Carnival could have turned out a laughable mess. But the films dark waking dream atmosphere is well realized. They had some really great locations– the pavilion, the wooden bridge, the organ factory and the church with the "casting out demons" stained glass. The actress playing the heroine is lucky (or skillful) casting, too; she doesn't look or act quite like the average person, which is perfect for the story. If I picked one thing to complain about, it would be the interlude with the guy from across the hall in the rooming house, about the writing of that section and especially about the actor who played him. But I won't. There's just too much good to be said about this small masterpiece of independent film making.

Ten stars. See it.