Movie Review: Evil Dead (How to Make a Remake That Doesn't Piss Me Off)

PROLOGUE

In Which I Apologize

I  really thought that this was going to be easier to write.

I have strong opinions on how to remake a horror film and I loved the new EVIL DEAD. This blog post should be a cinch.

But it hasn't.

In all honesty, I think I (for once) have too many opinions.  Remakes are so despised by the horror community that I really feel like I need to come to their defense.  And the only way to do that is to be far more verbose than I like to be on a day to day basis.  Don't worry...I'll put in a  lot of pictures and videos to break up the monotony.

PART I

In Which I Defend Remakes

I don't hate remakes.

Whoa!!  Put down your torches and pitchforks.  Let me explain.

I'm not saying I love all remakes.  PSYCHO was terrible.  THE HITCHER sucked.  THE STEPFATHER? Hunka hunka burnin' suck.  However, the main issue was that these films was that they were carbon copies of much better films, not that they were remakes  The original version of THE HITCHER was a twisty Psychological cat and mouse game with an emphasis on suspense.  The remake loses the subtext, tells the exact same story, and throws us a curve ball by.......making the protagonist a woman.  Whoa!!!  Also, Sean Bean is no Rutger Hauer.   The remake of PSYCHO is even worse because it changes nothing.  NOTHING!!! It is a shot for shot remake of one of Hitchcock's greatest movies.,,,starring Vince "The Break-up" Vaughn.

Image Source: scifinow.co.uk

In my opinion, good remakes subvert an audiences expectations by playing with their knowledge of the previous films, putting a new spin on the villain's motives, or taking the material into new directions while paying homage to the films that came before.  For example, everyone who has seen the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre knows what happens when the teens pick up The Hitchhiker at the beginning of the movie.  Imagine my surprise when I started to watch the remake and The Hitchhiker is not a member of the family, it is a young victim of the Chainsaw Family who commits suicide in the teens' car to avoid getting caught.  After this scene I had no idea what to expect and, even though the rest of the movie plays out fairly similarly to the original, the fact that the screenwriter took the intro in a new direction kept me off balance for the entire film.

Image Source:Badassdigest.com

The term "remake" is also hard to properly define as it relates to the horror genre.  Aren't many horror movie "sequels" glorified remakes of the movies that came before?  Think about it, whether you are talking about Nightmare on Elm Street, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, or Friday the 13th, every sequel is essentially a remake of the first film in that series with new victims.  Some of the details may change, but the stories are always very familiar because audiences love familiarity.  Teens go where they shouldn't.  Teens have sex.  Teens get slaughtered.  One last teen "defeats" the killer and either gets signed to the sequel or starts hitting the convention circuit.

Part III

In Which I Express My Love of THE EVIL DEAD

Which brings me to THE EVIL DEAD.

Simply put, I loved this movie.  EVIL DEAD (2013) took everything I knew about the original and turned it upside down, while giving us small winks and nods to remind us that we were in the same universe that Ash Williams had visited back in 1981.  The filmmakers knew that they were going to be in trouble with fans if they created a carbon copy, and so they immediately dropped many of the things associated with EVIL DEAD: the humor, the look of the Deadites, the cheesy dialogue, and, most importantly, Ash.  I think the absence of any version of Bruce Campbell's iconic schmo/hero enabled EVIL DEAD to tell a new story and cut its own bloody swath while standing on its own Deadite feet more than any other story choice they could have made.

Don't worry, the new film pays homage where necessary...but many of these scenes are subtle.  In fact, in many cases, the homage is use of old sound effects or the presence of important weapons or modes of transportation.  Even scenes that reference the original are so tonally different that they feel like a true plot-point rather than lip service for the fans.  Most importantly, the set-up of five friends going to the woods has been updated for an age when people can party at home...they really don't need to drive into the middle of nowhere to get drunk and have sex.  Instead we have five friends coming together to help our heroine, Mia, kick her drug habit.  This creates a completely new scenario and also makes it more plausible when the friends decide to ignore her claims of "evil in the woods."

Of course, all the clever scripting in the world couldn't save an EVIL DEAD movie if the special effects sucked. And, thank god, they don't.  The filmmakers chose to go old school and keep the effects practical, visceral, and bathed in gore.  I have never seen a movie on the big screen that so gleefully cut its stars to ribbons and unapologetically sprays them with fake blood and other fluids.  I won't spoil anything for those who haven't seen it, but self mutilation is the word of the day, and I don't think the fake blood industry is going out of business anytime soon.

My only minor quibble comes with the ending.  Something felt off, and I don't know what it was,  The final fight really came out of left-field and felt out of place with the tone of the rest of the movie.  Suddenly I felt like I was watching the final fight in TERMINATOR, but the T-800 was recast as a demon with no nipples.  The ending also felt rushed.  The screen cut to black almost immediately after the fight had finished.  No pause to reflect, no additional plot point, just a hard cut to black.  For some reason this bugged me, although I have a feeling that more ending was shot and not used.  I guess I'll have to wait for the Blu Ray.

And, believe me, when EVIL DEAD crawls onto Blu later this year, I'm definitely visiting these woods again.

Rating: 9/10