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Evil Dead
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by New Line Cinema
Sales Rank: 7965
Price: $9.99
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In the fall of 1979, Sam Raimi and his merry band headed into the woods of rural Tennessee to make a movie. They emerged with a roller coaster of a film packed with shocks, gore, and wild humor, a film that remains a benchmark for the genre. Ash (cult favorite Bruce Campbell) and four friends arrive at a backwoods cabin for a vacation, where they find a tape recorder containing incantations from an ancient book of the dead. When they play the tape, evil forces are unleashed, and one by one the friends are possessed. Wouldn't you know it, the only way to kill a "deadite" is by total bodily dismemberment, and soon the blood starts to fly. Raimi injects tremendous energy into this simple plot, using the claustrophobic set, disorienting camera angles, and even the graininess of the film stock itself to create an atmosphere of dread, punctuated by a relentless series of jump-out-of-your-seat shocks. <I>The Evil Dead</I> lacks the more highly developed sense of the absurd that distinguish later entries in the series--<I>Evil Dead 2</I> and <I>Army of Darkness</I>--but it is still much more than a gore movie. It marks the appearance of one of the most original and visually exciting directors of his generation, and it stands as a monument to the triumph of imagination over budget. <i>--Simon Leake</i>
Viewer Reviews
"The Evil Dead" is an innovative, ground-breaking horror classic that has developed a cult following. Director Sam Raimi ("Darkman" and "Spiderman") was highly influenced by other well established horror megahits such as "The Exorcist," "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre," and "Night of the Living Dead." A young Bruce Campbell ("Maniac Cop," "The Woods," and "Bubba Ho-Tep") is college student Ash; him and his friends rent a secluded cabin in the mountains. ("The Evil Dead" was filmed mostly in the backwoods of Morristown, near my home of Knoxville, Tennessee.) Demonic forces inhabit these woods. After discovering the Book of the Dead, the friends begin turning into demon possessed zombies. There is levitation and green vomit spewing as in the "Exorcist." They have learned that only bodily dismemberment can destroy a demon. Numerous sharp farm implements hang from the cabin's ceiling. Ash uses a chainsaw to slice up one of his friends. Hence, the similarity to "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre."
Fans of Lucio Fulci ("Zombie," "The House by the Cemetery, and "The Beyond") will enjoy "The Evil Dead." It has a tremendous amount of disgusting gore. Some of it is too over the top for my taste. It is this excessive gore that kept it from gaining the popularity that was achieved by "Halloween" - another low-budget horror classic. Also, there is too much dark humor for me. Some dialogue came across as silly. However, it helped ease the tension created by some of the graphic scenes of demonic violence. Furthermore, the acting and directing was amateurish, almost to the point that it lent the film a homemade feel.
"Evil Dead" is highly recommended for fans of zombie films, especially those which involve demons such as Lamberto Bava's "Demons" and "Demons 2." The DVD from Anchor Bay is excellent. It has interesting features that include outtakes and deleted scenes and great commentary from star Bruce Campbell. It is very educational to learn how this movie was finally released after five years of production and at a miniscule cost of $375,000.
Note of Interest: As stated earlier, Lamberto Bava's film "Demons" is similar to "The Evil Dead." His father, Mario Bava, was considered the Italian Maestro of the Macabre. In his film "Baron Blood," the hideous baron is released from his tomb when a parchment was read. This scene is similar to the one in "The Evil Dead" when the five friends listen to the tape recording of a professor reading from the Book of the Dead, which resulted in the demons being released from the ground outside the cabin.
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