A group of teenage friends travel to a remote cabin in the
woods for a holiday. Once there, they discover a strange looking book and a
tape-recorded translation that claims it’s the Necronomicon: the Book of the
Dead. After they listen to the tape, which also includes eerie incantations,
the trip turns deadly as whatever fatal horror the book has unleashed comes to
the cabin and possesses its inhabitants, zombifying them one by one. Soon there
is one left and the struggle is on to live throughout the rest of the night
without dying gruesomely or going insane.
This is the debut film from
writer/director Sam Raimi and is a true exhibition of the ‘movie nerd’ success
story. Leading the horror genre onto a new frontier, The Evil Dead is really a horror movie for the sake of being a
horror movie. Although influential and terrifying back in its day, which was
1982 for those are interested, a modern movie watcher cannot sit through this
without yelling at the stupidity of its characters and laughing at its
ridiculousness. Having said that there are still obvious reasons why this movie
is such an iconic one in horror movie history, not mentioning its immodest
boast of being ‘the ultimate experience in gruelling terror’.
A group of
teenage friends travel to a remote cabin in the woods for a holiday. Once
there, they discover a strange looking book and a tape-recorded translation
that claims it’s the Necronomicon: the Book of the Dead. After they listen to
the tape, which also includes eerie incantations, the trip turns deadly as
whatever fatal horror the book has unleashed comes to the cabin and possesses
its inhabitants, zombifying them one by one. Soon there is one left and the
struggle is on to live throughout the rest of the night without dying
gruesomely or going insane.
Before we go into what’s actually pretty cool and
good about this movie, let’s first get all the badness out of the way…
As far
as a story goes, there isn’t one. Even The Texas Chainsaw Massacre had a more convincing story than this. Essentially
it’s about a bunch of teenagers who go to a cabin that is in a haunted wood,
pretty much playing to all the staples and horror genre clichés. The minimal
cast of 5 people proves to be rather painful as there are absolutely no good
performances to boast of and there is no character development or
establishment. It’s just one big gore fest.
Having said this, because some of
the scenes are so bad and so clichéd, you have to wonder whether it’s written
that deliberately. A red light went off for me when trees practically raped the
first victim… yeah you read that right. Raimi pulls out all stops for the gore
side of the ‘story’ with some pretty impressive achievements in makeup, very
expressive and stimulating to-the-ground and fast moving camera direction, and
even a stint of coloured tapioca and claymation (admittedly this is where the
movie gets kind of ridiculous, but it’s still compelling).
The camera
direction is without a doubt the star of the show, getting audiences hooked
right from the get-go with fast-moving tracking shots, intense close-ups,
down-to-the-ground angles, and even some spooky upside down and round-the-room
shots.
Starring Bruce Campbell, Ellen Sandweiss, Richard DeManincor, Betsy
Baker, and Theresa Tilly, The Evil Dead
is definitely a stamp in horror movie history. Filled with gore, creepy camera
shots, suspense, icky surprises, and gore, it’s not a film that’s for everyone,
but fans and supporters of the genre will probably appreciate its cult status
and what it did for the genre.
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