There’s a moment in Evil Dead, a decisively pointless updating of Sam Raimi’s 1981 low-budget classic, when a character who has been taken over by a demon spews blood all over someone’s face for five seconds. It’s a disgusting moment in an altogether disgusting but brutally dull horror that should give you an indication of the sort of thing it’s aiming for.
Taking the basic premise of the original, it centres on a group of entirely disposable 20-somethings who, with the exception of the geeky spectacled one who unleashes the evil of the title, look like they’ve stepped off the cover of a magazine. They go up to a secluded cabin in order to help one of them who’s a drug addict go cold turkey. Once there they inevitably discover the mysterious basement below and the dreaded Book of the Dead. Before long the evil of the title has been unleashed and horrific chaos ensues.
This grim and cynical remake retains none of what made the original tick (hinting at certain familiar elements only seeks to remind you just how good it was in the first place), instead opting for a “see how far we can push the gore” mentality. It’s shock value tactics plain and simple and it gets to the point where it becomes inert, repetitive and rather boring.
In comparison to the original it lacks the sense of heightened, ridiculous fun (part of that may be down to a crucial lack of Bruce Campbell) and as a standalone, modern day horror it blends into the crowd of insanely gory but ultimately ineffective shock horrors where characters we don’t care about get relentlessly punished.
The film’s ultimate redeeming feature can be found in its productions values. Impeccable sound design and impressive make-up and gore effects more than get the job done. Hacked limbs and infected skin look fittingly disgusting and at least prove the filmmakers are going about it right – shoddy production values would have made it too much to bear.
However, no amount of technical mastery can save what is a disappointingly po-faced and self-serious horror remake that’s content to just pile one over-the-top and ridiculously gory set-piece on top of another. Gore-hounds will likely be satisfied with the amount of blood and chopped flesh put on display but it’s not going to do anything for anyone else, especially not those interested in their horror having a little more substance or sense of fun to it. The tagline reads “The Most Terrifying Film You Will Ever Experience.” Rarely has a tagline been so misleading.
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Evil Dead is released in UK cinemas on April 19th.