|
lot of people find it hard to believe now, but "Evil
Dead," the first film in the "Evil Dead" series (it includes
sequels "Evil Dead 2: Dead by Dawn" and "Army
of Darkness") was actually not a comedy/horror spoof, but a pure
horror film. Or Splatter film, since the movie is essentially a retread of the
"college students go on vacation and get slaughtered" premise
prevalent in many Slasher/Splatter films. The '70s invented the formula, the
'80s fine-tuned it, and the '90s made them popular again.
"Evil Dead" stars Bruce Campbell as Ash, one of 5
college students who journey to a cabin in a remote location for a little
romance, and finds a whole lot of trouble instead. At the cabin, they encounter
a book that can summon the dead and tape recordings made by the cabin's previous
inhabitant, warning of the book's content and evil spirits lurking out in the
woods. The kids, of course, dismiss both book and recording, but soon said evil
spirits take notice of the cabin's new inhabitants and decide to come out to
play. After a number of the victims – er, characters – are possessed and
turned into ghouls, it's up to Ash, the whiny coward of the bunch, to find his
courage and grab a chainsaw…
Once again, I should mention that "Evil Dead" is
a straight horror flick. It was made to scare, and there are very little
intentional laughs. Since this is a very, very low budget effort by
director Sam Raimi ("Spiderman"),
there are plenty of cheap special effects, a lot of bad acting by inexperienced
actors, and technical mishaps. All that said, "Evil Dead" scared the
hell out of me when I first saw it, and newcomers who have only seen the sequels
will find a very rude awakening with this 1979-produced movie.
A very young Bruce Campbell leads the cast and plays his
Ash straight in this one. The Ash we encounter here is still very much a coward
(although the character never does completely lose the coward label in later
sequels), and it takes him quite a while to get into the whole hero groove.
Campbell, despite showing inexperience, is nevertheless still the best thing
about the film. We can already see that smart-aleck personality starting to take
shape here, and it's quite a treat to see Campbell in the prime of his
deadite-fighting days.
Writer/director Sam Raimi shoots the movie with a 16mm
camera (the choice camera for all filmmakers with no budget) and as a result the
movie looks appropriately grainy and gritty. The camerawork is exceptional and
is constantly moving, zipping through the woods and knocking down trees via POV
of the (moving) spirits. Once the ghouls attack the cabin, the blood flows
freely, people are possessed left and right, and even the trees get into the act
by raping one of the girls. (What was that? Yes, you heard me right. The trees rape
one of the girls.)
On a completely different subject, it's quite interesting
to see how the deadites (the evil spirits of the series) eventually de-evolves
from destructive ghouls out for blood in this original to joke-spouting hags in
"Army of
Darkness." I'm still not quite sure why the movie de-evolved so much
into slapstick humor and total hilarity, but I suppose it might have something
to do with Raimi and Campbell feeling that the series couldn't go anywhere else
except into cartoonish territory. In a way, the series really lost much of its
edge (if not all of them) in favor of one-liners and Three Stooges gags,
but then again I suppose it was inevitable. As the saying goes, nothing good
lasts forever.
"Evil Dead" was certainly one of the best
no-budget horror films to come across the landscape back in 1982, and remains so
now. I've yet to see a film with such limited advantages surpass "Evil
Dead" in sheer creativity, enthusiasm, and a lot of hard work and
dedication. This one is going to last a while, and even evil spirits and
women-raping trees won't stop its continued popularity.
|
