The Rage: Carrie 2

Believe it or not there are flashes of the old Carrie, Brian De Palma's 1976 horror thriller based on Stephen King's first novel, on display in Katt Shea's workwomanlike sequel/copy, The Rage: Carrie 2. Unfortunately, they're literally scenes from the original. Twenty years after Carrie White turned her high school prom night into a teen barbecue, Rachel Lang (newcomer Emily Bergl) struggles with that old familiar feeling of telekinesis as her emotional world is rocked, first, by the suicide of her best friend, and second, by the attention paid to her by handsome varsity football jock Jesse Ryan (Jason London). The flashbacks come courtesy of Amy Irving, who reprises her role as Sue Snell (originally a tormentor, then a sympathizer, of Carrie White), now a school guidance counselor who suspects that Rachel has the window-bangin', door slammin' touch and rightfully worries that a bunch of insensitive cliquish teens are gonna get hurt. In a plot that duplicates exactly the original, Rachel is harassed by her fellow students, innocently dated by a hunk, duped at a large social gathering, and then displays her considerable displeasure through various murderous special effects. As teen horror flicks go, The Rage: Carrie 2 is not especially bad, it's just terribly derivative. Very optional. (R. Pitman)