Visions from the Abyss: Carnival of Souls and Skinamarink Redefine Experimental Dread

In the dim corners of cinema, two films whisper horrors that linger long after the screen fades to black: Carnival of Souls and Skinamarink, masters of the unseen terror.

Experimental horror thrives on the edges of convention, where ambiguity breeds unease and suggestion supplants spectacle. Herk Harvey’s Carnival of Souls (1962) and Kyle Edward Ball’s Skinamarink (2022) stand as twin pillars in this subgenre, separated by six decades yet united in their minimalist assault on the psyche. These low-budget visions prioritise atmosphere over narrative clarity, inviting viewers to project their fears into voids of image and sound. This comparison unearths their shared innovations, contrasting techniques, and lasting ripples across horror cinema.

  • How both films weaponise absence, turning empty spaces into sources of profound dread.
  • The evolution of experimental sound design from eerie organs to distorted whispers across eras.
  • Their influence on modern horror, proving budget constraints can birth timeless nightmares.

Ghostly Origins: The Birth of Carnival of Souls

Herk Harvey crafted Carnival of Souls on a shoestring budget of around $100,000, shooting over two weeks in Lawrence, Kansas, during a break from his day job directing industrial films. The story centres on Mary Henry (Candace Hilligoss), a church organist who survives a car plunge off a bridge during a drag race, only to be haunted by visions of a ghoul and an abandoned lakeside pavilion. Her journey spirals into surreal disorientation, culminating in a revelation that blurs life and death. Harvey, inspired by the desolate Sunflower State pavilions he encountered, infused the film with authentic Midwestern bleakness, using non-actors and practical locations to heighten its raw authenticity.

The film’s opening crash sequence sets a tone of inexorable fate, with Mary’s emergence from the murky river symbolising a limbo state. Critics often overlook how Harvey’s background in educational shorts informed his precise framing: wide shots of empty streets emphasise isolation, while tight close-ups on Hilligoss’s vacant stare convey dissociation. This economical approach anticipated the found-footage aesthetic, though predating it by decades, relying on stark black-and-white cinematography to evoke film noir shadows without budgetary excess.

Production anecdotes reveal ingenuity born of necessity. Harvey sourced the iconic calliope score from a stock library, its carnival waltz underscoring the pavilion’s allure as a threshold to the otherworldly. The ghoul, played by Harvey himself in greasepaint, shambles through scenes with silent menace, his pallid face a harbinger of Mary’s unraveling. These choices cement the film’s status as proto-experimental horror, influencing directors from David Lynch to the V/H/S collective.

Domestic Nightmares: Skinamarink’s Viral Void

Kyle Edward Ball’s Skinamarink emerged from YouTube shorts, evolving into a $15,000 micro-budget feature shot on consumer cameras in his childhood home. Four-year-old brothers Kevin and Kaylee awake to find their father vanished, their house warping into a labyrinth of darkness haunted by a disembodied voice. Static shots of ceilings, toys, and doorless walls dominate, with dialogue muffled and plot fragmented. Released amid pandemic isolation, it grossed millions via niche streaming, proving viral potential in experimental form.

Ball drew from childhood night terrors, adapting analog horror aesthetics: pixelated VHS glitches, prolonged darkness, and ASMR whispers build tension through repetition. A key scene lingers on a cartoon playing endlessly, its innocence clashing with encroaching shadows, mirroring Mary’s organ recitals as futile anchors to normalcy. The film’s 100-minute runtime tests patience, yet this endurance mirrors the siblings’ entrapment, forcing audiences into empathetic paralysis.

Behind-the-scenes, Ball employed child actors Nova Gaver and Lucas Paul with minimal direction, capturing unscripted fear. Practical effects like reversed footage for levitating scenes and manipulated audio layers create a dream-logic unreality. Unlike Carnival‘s linear drift, Skinamarink rejects coherence, embracing post-modern fragmentation that resonates in an era of TikTok micro-horrors.

Minimalism Unleashed: Stripping Horror to Bone

Both films exemplify minimalism as maximal terror. Carnival of Souls dispenses with gore or jump scares, favouring Mary’s existential drift through a town that ignores her presence. Her interactions with the landlady and minister feel scripted yet alien, underscoring her spectral status. This “dead among the living” trope prefigures Skinamarink‘s vanishing parents, where the house itself becomes antagonist, doors vanishing into blackness.

Visual restraint unites them: Harvey’s high-contrast monochrome renders Kansas plains ghostly, while Ball’s low-light digital noise evokes primordial chaos. Neither relies on monsters in frame; the ghoul appears sparingly, much like Skinamarink‘s implied entity, glimpsed only in extremities. This off-screen menace amplifies Freudian uncanny, where the familiar turns profane.

Class dynamics subtly infuse both. Mary’s organist role evokes repressed Protestant guilt, her survival a Puritan reckoning. In Skinamarink, suburban domesticity crumbles, exposing parental absence as modern anxiety. These socioeconomic undercurrents elevate pulp premises into cultural critiques.

Symphonies of Silence: Auditory Assaults

Sound design elevates both to art. Carnival‘s calliope swells into a dirge, its repetitive melody hypnotising like a siren’s call, composed by Gene Kauer and Douglas Knapp for hypnotic effect. Silence punctuates visions, Mary’s footsteps echoing in voids. Ball amplifies this with Skinamarink‘s lo-fi palette: distorted lullabies, muffled cries, and vinyl crackle create subsonic dread, inspired by 1970s public access tapes.

Comparative listening reveals evolution. Harvey’s score, recorded live on a theatre organ, lends theatricality; Ball’s bedroom mixes employ binaural recording for immersive paranoia. Both manipulate volume extremes, from piercing highs to abyssal lows, conditioning viewers for perpetual anticipation.

In scene analysis, Mary’s pavilion dancehall waltz syncs music to her pallid sway, a danse macabre. Skinamarink‘s “Hide and seek” incantation distorts into threat, sound becoming entity. These choices democratise horror, accessible yet profound.

Shadows and Psyche: The Power of the Unseen

Psychological depth stems from implication. Mary’s blackouts and ghoul pursuits probe trauma’s grip, her final monologue affirming undeath. Hilligoss’s performance, stiff yet poignant, embodies shell-shock, informed by post-war neuroses. Ball’s child protagonists vocalise primal fear, their whispers articulating collective childhood dread.

Mise-en-scène dissects dread: Carnival‘s abandoned funhouse mirrors fractured identity; Skinamarink‘s toy-strewn floors evoke lost innocence. Lighting choices—Harvey’s harsh key lights, Ball’s flashlight beams—carve faces from obscurity, humanising yet dehumanising.

Gender lenses reveal nuances. Mary’s autonomy erodes in male gazes (minister, doctor), paralleling female hysteria tropes. Skinamarink‘s sibling bond subverts isolation, though maternal loss looms large.

Effects and Artifice: Low-Fi Innovations

Special effects prioritise suggestion. Harvey used greasepaint and slow-motion for the ghoul, simple dissolves for visions; no hydraulics needed. Ball’s digital glitches, practical levitations via wires, and negative space craft illusions affordably. Both prove practical trumps CGI in intimacy.

Impact endures: Carnival‘s crash reused stock footage cleverly; Skinamarink‘s darkness ratios (90% black screen) innovate viewer fatigue as device. These techniques influence A24’s atmospheric wave.

Legacy in the Dark: Ripples Through Time

Carnal languished until Night of the Living Dead revival, inspiring Session 9 and Lake Mungo. Skinamarink spawned TikTok recreations, bridging analog to digital horror. Together, they validate experimentalism against slasher dominance.

Production hurdles highlight resilience: Harvey battled print quality; Ball faced child labour laws. Their triumphs affirm indie ethos.

Genre evolution credits them: from 1960s surrealism to 2020s liminal spaces, they anchor horror’s avant-garde.

Director in the Spotlight: Herk Harvey

Homer Edward “Herk” Harvey was born on 3 June 1924 in Denver, Colorado, into a family that nurtured his creative spark. After serving in the US Navy during World War II as a photographer, he studied drama at the University of Denver, graduating in 1948. Harvey entered filmmaking through Centron Corporation in Lawrence, Kansas, producing over 400 educational and industrial shorts from the 1950s to 1980s, covering topics from dental hygiene to traffic safety. His dry wit infused these with subtle artistry, honing skills in rapid production and resourceful effects.

In 1962, during a company vacation to Saltair, Utah, Harvey conceived Carnival of Souls, self-financing and directing his sole feature. Its cult success overshadowed his shorts, leading to honorary retrospectives. He continued at Centron until retirement in 1986, mentoring talents like John Waters indirectly through horror fandom. Harvey succumbed to heart failure on 9 November 1990 in Lawrence, aged 66, leaving a legacy of Midwestern minimalism.

Influences spanned Val Lewton’s suggestion-based horrors and Italian neorealism, blended with his Protestant upbringing for moral ambiguity. Filmography highlights include: What About Juvenile Delinquency? (1955), a cautionary short; Why Vandalism? (1955), social commentary; Carnival of Souls (1962), his masterpiece; The Slave Hunters (1960), adventure docudrama; Operation Barbershop (1965), hygiene film; and late works like Shake Hands with Danger (1980), safety staple. Harvey’s oeuvre champions efficiency, proving corporate craft births nightmares.

Actor in the Spotlight: Candace Hilligoss

Candace Hilligoss entered the world on 17 May 1938 in Carthage, Missouri, daughter of a school superintendent. She trained at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York, debuting on Broadway in The Egghead (1957). Relocating to Hollywood, she landed her defining role in Carnival of Souls (1962), her ethereal presence making Mary Henry iconic. Post-film, roles dwindled; she appeared in The Swinger (1966) and TV’s Alfred Hitchcock Hour.

Marrying in 1965, Hilligoss retreated from screens, working as a legal secretary and raising children. Rare returns included Blood Bath (1966) and The Watcher in the Woods (1980). No major awards graced her career, yet horror connoisseurs revere her. She passed on 1 January 2020 in Columbia, South Carolina, aged 81.

Her style evoked vulnerability, influenced by Method acting peers. Filmography: Atlantis: The Lost Continent (1961), fantasy; Carnival of Souls (1962), horror pinnacle; The Swinger (1966), comedy; Blood Bath (1966), exploitation; The Watcher in the Woods (1980), Disney chiller; TV spots in Naked City (1962) and Hitchcock anthology. Hilligoss embodied quiet intensity, her legacy spectral.

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Bibliography

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