Evil Dead..the remake

[saltysam]

Sounding very promising.

[Markgway]

It does. I'm gonna avoid reading those reviews in full (the quotes get the point across) and just see it fresh.

[HungFist]

wow, was this a positive surprise!

Evil Dead (USA, 2013) [Cinema] – 3.5/5
An unexpected treat: a good remake. The new Evil Dead is an enjoyable bloodbath that amps up the gore factor to 11. Indeed, this is no doubt the goriest film ever passed with an R-rating. Better yet, the visceral bloodletting is almost fully hand-made, with minimal use of CGI. The storyline is a variation of the original, but thankfully doesn’t replicate scenes too faithfully. There’s a good balance between modern horror and classic cabin horror, with some very stylish use of lighting and visual details. Jokes and postmodern bullshit are thankfully left out, with the only humor rising from the violence that becomes absurdly extreme. The middle third takes a small dive with repetitive scenes of self mutilation and rapid editing, and the film lacks the freshness and charm of the original, but as a whole it’s an effective stomach churning ride.


somewhat amused by how many guys dragged their girlfriends to see this with them. Bad mistake!

Interesting to hear Mark's opinion. I think this may be a bit too violent for his taste, with slight torture porn influences in a few scenes. Though I don't think the film should be accused for being to gross: the original did its best to be as gross and violent as possible to the extent it got itself banned in a number of countries...

[Markgway]

I will check it out, but not at the cinema. So you may have to wait a bit for my own take. I'm fully prepared to give the film a fair crack of the whip though, as always. I think only the tree rape from the original was controversial, though I always found it too absurd to be offensive. Yes, the UK banned it, but UK censorship was fucked up back then. Most of today's extreme horror would have been heavily cut or banned under the Ferman regime. The gore was comical (intended or not) and wholly unrealistic (unlike much of today's splatter output).

[HungFist]

I will check it out, but not at the cinema. So you may have to wait a bit for my own take. I'm fully prepared to give the film a fair crack of the whip though, as always. I think only the tree rape from the original was controversial, though I always found it too absurd to be offensive. Yes, the UK banned it, but UK censorship was fucked up back then. Most of today's extreme horror would have been heavily cut or banned under the Ferman regime. The gore was comical (intended or not) and wholly unrealistic (unlike much of today's splatter output).

Are you talking about The Evil Dead (81) now or back then (when?)? Of course the remake is more shocking because we are comparing a new film and a 32 year old film. However, the amount of bannings the original received suggests '81 audiences didn't find it too comical to be taken seriously. We should compare The Evil Dead's (81) shock ability in the year 1981 against the remake's shock ability in the year 2013.

The amount bannings could be because of, like you said, censorship was more strict back then. But it could also suggest the original was more shocking (at the time of its release) than the remake is (in 2013). Hard for me to say, I was born 5 years after the original was made.

[Shingster]

The gore wasn't viewed as comical back in 81, mostly because aside from big hollywood numbers like The Thing & Alien & The Omen, etc this was the standards of special effects back in the late 70s/early 80s. I'm sure some found it amusingly schlocky though, but it was generally perceived as a proper horror film. My earliest memory of the film was getting hold of an uncut french VHS of it back in the late 80s when it was only available on a heavily cut UK VHS, and even back then The Evil Dead was considered a seriously gory horror film.

[Markgway]

The gore wasn't viewed as comical back in 81, mostly because aside from big hollywood numbers like The Thing & Alien & The Omen, etc this was the standards of special effects back in the late 70s/early 80s. I'm sure some found it amusingly schlocky though, but it was generally perceived as a proper horror film. My earliest memory of the film was getting hold of an uncut french VHS of it back in the late 80s when it was only available on a heavily cut UK VHS, and even back then The Evil Dead was considered a seriously gory horror film.

I was only a toddler when the film came out here so I didn't see it until the hideously cut VHS was granted a cert in the early 90s. Maybe by that point things had changed somewhat, but I never found the film shocking or controversial. I suppose the reductions softened the blow, but even uncut the film is splattery gross, but (crucially) not 'sick'. As strong as the original might have been, it's nothing compared to today's commonplace torture porn. Ergo, any filmmaker that wants to "SHOCK!" has to put on screen material that would make a rat vomit. Kermode described the remake as 'nasty, not scary' (paraphrased), which seems par for the course. But, as promised, I will make up my own mind in due course.

[Shingster]

Yes it was 1990 that it came back out on VHS in the UK, so it would have been around then that I caught it on VHS as I recall it was being re-released around the time that I got hold of this French tape. IIRC there was only a few minutes of cuts (maybe less than 3min) but they basically trimmed every single gore shot! I definitely recall that the eye gouging was significantly cut in the censored version, plus the ankle-stabbing. It's funny you mention the "splattery" nature of the film because I said pretty much the same when comparing this remake to the original on another forum. Might as well paste that post here:

The problem this film has is that it's so strait-laced in its intention to gross you out, it's just violence, gore, violence, gore, violence, gore, The End; which I guess isn't a bad thing if all you need from your horror films is to be shocked out of your ordinary sensibilities and taken on a queasy ride for an hour and half. This it does well, Fede's Evil Dead is slickly made (particularly the audio design), but it's very much an endurance feat like French Horror New Wave (is that a term?) shockers À l'intérieur and Martyrs.

The problem is that we expect more from the Evil Dead franchise. IMO this remake comes close to matching the tone & intent that the original had back in 1981 (and it continued to have throughout the 80s), but it crosses the line from gruesome-fun to just plain gruesome. Raimi managed never crossed that line in the original, he went overboard with the grand guignol and deliberately set out to shock, but his direction was also quirky enough that it never got too intense.

I think he's been quoted as saying that he approached the film like a "one man three stooges film with blood" which imo doesn't mean he set out to make a horror-comedy, but rather he understood that violence in horror and comedy can be two sides of the same coin. In comedy you can put someone through the ringer with "harmless" slapstick, but in horror you can use "harmful" slapstick to revolt in a way that alleviates tension.

IMO if there's one scene in Raimi's film that typifies this it's the scene when Ash "decapitates" Linda with the shovel and then you have that great shot of Linda's headless corpse violently bleeding out onto Ash's face. It's gross and it gives you a laugh because of all the **** Ash has been through leading up to this. There's nothing like that in the remake, even though the characters are put through the ringer so much more than Ash in the original. It's screaming out for some form of release and IMO the only scene you could say provides any release is right near the end.

For the record, I enjoyed this remake, but thought it was pretty disposable. Well made but rather forgettable given the amount of Evil Dead clones that have cropped up over the years. This does it better than pretty much all of them except for Cabin in the Woods though I guess.

[Markgway]

Fede's Evil Dead is slickly made (particularly the audio design), but it's very much an endurance feat like French Horror New Wave (is that a term?) shockers À l'intérieur and Martyrs.

I'm out.