Directed by:
Fede AlvarezCinematography:
Aaron MortonComposer:
Roque BañosCast:
Jane Levy, Shiloh Fernandez, Jessica Lucas, Lou Taylor Pucci, Elizabeth Blackmore, Stephen Butterworth, Jim McLarty, Phoenix Connolly, Bruce Campbell (more)VOD (3)
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First time director Fede Alvarez helms this reworking of Sam Raimi's 1981 cult horror. In an effort to straighten out their drug-ravaged friend Mia (Jane Levy), a group of five 20-somethings decide to decamp to an isolated backwoods cabin in the mountains of Tennessee. Once there, however, the group find themselves beset by demons from the nearby woods when they begin reading from an unearthed Book of the Dead. (StudioCanal UK)
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Great potential undermined by low IQ. The film’s characters repeatedly behave like naive idiots and deal with situations
by taking unreasonable steps, just like in the worst horror B-movies. However, plenty of positives outweigh this
shortcoming (literally): violence, blood and gore are deliciously elaborated, many scenes are very intense even for
hardened horror fans, the pace of the film is killing (!), the bloody rain in the climax is impressive and the siren sound,
subconsciously causing panic in the audience, is just perfect. One of the better remakes of the horror classics we grew
up with.
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SPOILERS AHEAD. “Feast on this, motherfucker”, or “Why Men Don’t Understand Witchcraft and Why Women Shouldn’t Play with Electric Knives”. When this absurdly phallocentric horror movie turns into a “feminine” rape revenge flick at the end – using a quote from Carrie – that is the last of a plethora of extraordinary inconsistencies in content (as opposed to the filmmaking craftsmanship on display, which remains constantly at a high level). Evil Dead gives the impression of being a film by at least two directors, or rather multiple screenwriters (which it actually is), each of which took their own approach to Raimi’s original. Some of them are obliging toward horror fans, attempting to step out of the genre in a post-modern way and to make fun of the banality of slasher flicks. The others, who unfortunately had the last word, conversely slept through several decades and loaded the film down with terrors long past their sell-by date – fear of sexually transmitted infections (a curse passed on through bodily fluids) and of the wilderness, specifically a forest (which in the climax is ironically conquered using a non-environmentally friendly chainsaw). This disjointedness is directly personified in the film by the two male characters, who represent two possible types of viewers. David is prone to sentimentality and regrets every bruise. He lacks a sense of detachment. The rational Eric, on the other hand, remains above things, because he has read the book (everything has been written already). Like a knowledgeable horror-movie viewer, he has also read the source work, he knows what to expect and, together with the cynics in the audience, he is derisive of his friend’s oversensitivity. Both of them are necessary. If David doesn’t adhere to the horror clichés in his behaviour, the film would end a few amputations early, which we bloodthirsty viewers would not accept. Through Eric, we are simultaneously made aware that one the film’s creators ranks among the knowledgeable and sympathises with the community of horror fans. Surprisingly, the one who comes out on top in the end is neither of them, but rather the representative of the previously, mostly passively suffering (and, as the case may be, self-mutilating) gender. The delay in equalising gender strengths compels us to atypically redistribute our empathy to the body, which has caused others so much unpleasantness. (With respect to the body and carnality, it’s worth mentioning that the men in the film are usually penetrated by something – pellets, a needle, nails – whereas the women lose body parts – head, arms, legs; the Freudians can analyse and interpret that however they like). Thanks to the unsatisfying culmination of the drug storyline, we also retroactively become witnesses to the harshest withdrawal scene from Trainspotting. The unclear creative direction has unintentionally given rise to the subgenre of melodramatic horror, in which tumultuous family relationships are almost given greater care than the burning of witches and other forest activities (besides the gore scenes, the melodramatic “excessive” also refers to the spectacularly postponed reconciliation between the brother and sister). What can we learn from this very inconsistent film? The soul is more important than the body and drugs make you hoarse. Appendix: I definitely would not use the twice presented “medical” procedure of putting adhesive tape on anything that bleeds. 65%
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Before I begin, I find necessary to explain my relationship with Sam Raimi’s original Evil Dead trilogy. The first one is a very decent serious horror movie that today suffers from its low budget and poor (though good at the time) effects and make-up. The second one, with its exaggerated comedy is beyond me, and Army of Darkness, well, that one’s a joke already. In short, to me the original Evil Dead doesn’t have that cult status, which might be one of the reasons why I liked the new version so much. In any case, I refused to look forward to the remake at first because I was expecting something like the new Nightmare on Elm Street, i.e. a generic and sterile commercial product that’s only exploiting a known brand. But the intense and exceptionally good trailers convinced me (and also a lot of people who otherwise only watch horror once a year or so, and who now are complaining about the excessive brutality – quite a paradox). And well, the truth is that the film is exactly what the trailers promised: a brutal, intense and dirty horror ride that has no recent competition in the cinemas (which actually isn’t too hard, when the most serious competitor in modern gore horror is weak stuff like The Collection). But Evil Dead is not only violent and bloody carnage, it’s also dominated by a bleak and depressive atmosphere, basically from the very first minute. We meet the characters already in the middle of a depressive forest, which we don’t leave until the end. It has incredible pace, it’s intense – for me it was the most fun I had at the cinema in the last year (maybe with the exception of Tarantino’s Django). Script-wise, it’s nothing original, of course – what can you really expect from the premise of “students in a cabin in the forest” a year after Cabin in the Woods? It’s better to bet on a classic and give fans exactly what they want. My only complaint is about the characters, in particular one of them. Natalie is introduced in the first minutes and we don’t see her again for about half an hour (and there are only 5 characters!), after which she takes on that world very effectively. But it’s not a big enough problem to take away one star, because otherwise, the new Evil Dead is precisely what I expected from it. It’s just what I wanted and my congratulations to Alvarez for his work. And I also congratulate all the viewers who appreciate his enthusiasm as a fan (minor script problems notwithstanding). For the rest of the public, we are probably twisted and amoral beings who don’t understand art. But we should come to terms with it already :) PS: To close, I’m adding a quote from the review in “Bloody Disgusting”, with which I fully agree: "This is your Avengers, this is your Avatar, this is whatever you’ve been wanting a ‘big’ horror movie to be for over a decade. Not a perfect movie, but a near perfect experience."
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After watching the movie, I thought about how I would evaluate it. Surely, I can’t rate it higher than the original. But I gave that one a single star just for the brutality of it. I admit that I was a bit too harsh back then. Now I know that the brutal irony of the original deserved at least two stars, because it was missing in this movie and so it was just a brutal flop. So brutal, in fact, that they must have used hectoliters of fake blood. I think that Alvarez did a solid job, and a true horror fan must be really excited. It’s just a shame that they wanted the remake to be so different from the original that it ended up just as a pretty disgusting horror movie with actors who have stubs for arms and legs and surprisingly, they last longer than any of us could ever imagine.
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I have already seen more useless remakes, and I quite understand that after the festival of Raimi's bloody surrealism and genre phantasmagoria, which culminated in the brilliantly unruly and nonchalantly campy Army of Darkness, Fede Alvarez wanted to go his own way. In the first half of the film, thanks to the dense atmosphere and unruly gore violence, he is quite successful, but it can't be tightened without irony, especially with the eruption of clichés at the end. Exaggeration is missing just like Ash's hand, blood sprays all the way to the next hall, but it all just fades out over time. When the new version came up with a "new" story, it should have tried to at least get something out of it (drug dumplings motif). It did not do so, and so the result is barely above average. This composition of old familiar motifs simply lacks any added value other than beautifully hysterical babes. But while all of Evil Dead was a totally misogynistic trilogy at its core, Alvarez eventually ruined it completely unnecessarily. Bleeding girls with a chainsaw are cheesy, but they can’t beat Ash with a shotgun...
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Well... Nothing new under the sun. Nothing good either. There's suspense in only about two scenes (Natalie going to get sugar and water, the final hiding), otherwise it’s more or less boring, disgusting things that aren't really disgusting because they get old right away, and the promising idea with the rehab is brought down by the stupid behavior of everyone - the living, the dead and the half-dead.
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What else was there to expect? A brutal parade of the utmost B-movieness, from the dark action and confused editing to the brain-deadness of the main characters. It's quite entertaining in places, the make-up effects are top-notch, and a few attempted references to Raimi's trilogy manage to get the audience properly pumped up, but the unprecedented whirlwind of horror clichés and silly twists, together with the filmmakers' absolute inability to come up with anything new made this otherwise enjoyable gore-fest significantly frustrating. If I gave 3* to the original, I have to stick with 2* here.
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The carnage is decent, but at times the film comes across as naive and the big downside is that it doesn't really scare. On the contrary, it compensates for its lack of fear with brutal visuals and in some scenes, when it doesn't know which way to go, it just keeps on sprinkling gore to mask its uncertainty. It worked, but the ending was incredibly bizarre, and a little too hokey.
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The finale alone, with the motorbike, is something I had honestly been missing for quite some time. Since around about the scene with the circular saw in Frontière(s).
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The original Evil Dead is an unsurpassed classic, yet I have to give the creators of this remake a cautious salute for the very bloody ending and the genuinely creepy atmosphere in places. It's kind of the modern viewer’s consumable material, but definitely at the better end of the spectrum. I appreciate the direct references to Raimi's Evil Dead! [60%]
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When I burst out laughing during the second scene, I told myself that something must be wrong. And I was not mistaken. From the beginning to the end, it was very bad. I couldn't believe that I would eventually agree with the statements in the discussions here that the movie sometimes unintentionally seemed funny. Listing the negatives would take a long time to write, but it's not a good sign when I'm squirming in my seat halfway through the screening at the cinema. This was supposed to be the event of the year 2013, and in the end, it was the disappointment of the year 2013. I came to the theater excited, and I left disappointed. I disliked almost all the characters, except for Erik, who really shone towards the end and if it wasn't for him, I might have knocked off another star. The atmosphere was nonexistent, I got scared maybe twice, and the illogical thoughts of the main characters and their stupid lines were really laughable. So now at least a few positives. They certainly didn't hold back with the brutality, but personally, it didn't bother me. Occasionally, the computer effects were beautifully visible. :-) I also applaud the makeup artists, I really clap, I probably like these monsters the most, so I was extremely satisfied with that. But the makeup doesn't make the movie. I also consider it a positive that about 20 minutes towards the end when an original idea finally appeared and brought the movie out of the depths, but then there was some idiotic behavior by the main character, and we went back to the old ways. With all honesty, I can say without reservations that this was the worst horror movie I have ever seen in the cinema. And I am deeply sorry about that.
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