A girl gets torched to death for being demonically possessed. A group of young people arrive in the woods to help their friend Mia through heroin withdrawal. Her brother from whom she is estranged is among the group along with his girlfriend. He wants to make amends with Mia. A disgusting smell brings the group down to the cellar where animal corpses cover the floor, a shotgun is lying there as well as a scary book. David foolishly reads a passage from the book intended to summon a demon. Mia is ticked off, runs outside and gets into a car. She turns into a demon and drives the car into the lake. As she runs back to the group, she is raped by vines from a tree. Mia tells the group that there is a demon among them but none of them believe her. She kills David's dog and scalds herself in the shower. An attempt to rush her to hospital fails because the roads are flooded. Mia goes crazy as a demon and attacks everyone. The group has to look for ways to kill Mia and her host demon. Two of the girls in the group - Olivia and Natalie are attacked and turn into demons. As the survivors dwindle and five people die - leaving Mia as the sole survivor - the prophecy comes true and a big monster known as the Abomination attacks her. The sky is raining blood as well. Mia equips herself with a chainsaw to go into battle. Not as amusing as the Original film, the remake of Evil Dead is nonetheless more brutal, more gory and blood soaked. It is a well executed take on the original - because it is not a shot for shot remake and it posits some fresh ideas into its legendary predecessor. It was, of course, a bold move by Fede Alvarez to take on such an iconic, beloved and spectacular film as Evil Dead. He doesn't achieve perfection, but the film is different enough from the original so that the viewer is not comparing the two films all the time - unlike the remake of Carrie. What makes the film so successful is partially due to the lack of CGI rubbish in the film which makes the movie more realistic and closer to the spirit of the original. An entertaining and gory movie, Evil Dead deserves its place in the canon of the film series.
My first film watched was Carrie aged 2 on my dad's knee. Educated at The University of St Andrews and Trinity College Dublin. Fan of Arthouse, Exploitation, Horror, Euro Trash, Giallo, New French Extremism. Weaned at the bosom of a Russ Meyer starlet. The bleaker, artier or sleazier the better!
