Evil Dead (2013)

Directed by Fede Alvarez [Other horror films: Don’t Breathe (2016)]

This remake/soft reboot/re-imagining (however you wish to describe it) certainly ups the ante from the original film, but much like how I’ve never found The Evil Dead all that amazing, I’m likewise lukewarm to this rendition.

No doubt the gore here is noteworthy. What with electric knives cutting arms off, or faces getting peeled off, or tongues getting halved with box cutters, or any of the other various brutal scenes within, Evil Dead has the goods as far as gore’s concerned. It literally rains blood toward the end, so it’s not necessarily a movie for the queasy.

And all of that’s good-and-well, but that doesn’t make me any more a fan of the story. Personally, I’ve never found possession all that interesting. More than anything, when someone becomes demonically possessed, I just get annoyed that their friends and family keep getting fooled by their innocent acts after demonstrating utterly inhuman abilities.

That happens here, too, multiple times. I get it, Shiloh Fernandez’s character wants to believe the best of his sister, played by Jane Levy (Don’t Breathe), but come on, after some of the stuff that the demon does, get it through your head that it’s no longer your sister and do what needs to be done. Stuff like that just always aggravated me, and as such, Fernandez’s character didn’t leave much a positive impression.

Actually, the only one here I really liked was Lou Taylor Pucci. His character made mistakes now and again, but it’s through him we got most of the lore, so I definitely appreciate what he brought to the table. Jane Levy wasn’t bad, by any means, but for most of the film, she was a demon, so we don’t really get to spend that much time with her.

I guess the big issue is that I’ve never been a big fan of The Evil Dead series. I enjoy the second well enough, but the first and Army of Darkness aren’t really my cup of tea. No doubt the atmosphere of the original is decent, and this film itself does have a pretty epic finale, but possession-themed flicks aren’t my go-to when it comes to horror.

Evil Dead isn’t a bad movie due to this – I think it did enough right to satisfy many watching it. The setting (desolate cabin) and some prop pieces (especially that book, which looked hella hip, as the kids say) were commendable, but I did find the movie a bit below average, and that one-second post-credit scene with Bruce Campbell? Pointless.

All-in-all, the movie’s fine, with a decent amount of gore it can boast about. I’d just rather watch so many other things, personally.

6/10

This is one of the films covered by Fight Evil’s podcast. Listen below as Chucky (@ChuckyFE) and I discuss this one.