Review of The Evil Dead (1981) by Kieran F — 27 May 2014

The Evil Dead. Have to say I always had heard of this film but I never got a chance to watch it why IDK but I can tell you I was missing out.

The story is..slightly cleche in that it's about a group of Teenagers who go on a Spring break trip to a Isolated Cabin in Tennessee. There, they find the Naturon Demonto, a Sumerian variation of the Book of the Dead. Additionally, they play a tape of incantations from the book, which unleashes its demons and spirits. Upon hearing their voices on of the main Character ,Cheryl, and she get's attacked by these..demonic trees that try to rape her,now..this is probably the only low in the film (more on that later),.

Eventually as the film progress the remaining characters all get slowly and twisted possessed by the demonic book and the only Character left is Ash who if left fighting his friends for his life. Eventually ash Realizes the only way to stop his friends is to destroy the book.

I loved the film it was a great classic low budget horror film that worked. Mostly in part due to the atmosphere. The film had a great way of giving off this creepy atmosphere that just felt great or the film. Watching it I couldn't help but think to my self if Tim Burton had watched this and used it for his version of Sleepy hollow too. and The atmosphere was amped up with the help of the "First Person" camera angles. Much like Halloween this film never really shows you "The Villain"(Sure you see posed people and etc. but they're not really the villains) But you do see this...person for lack of a better word who does all these twisted things to these's Kids(from the Possession scene which is trippy and easily the best scene in the film to the weird Tree scene) It's great.

BUT none of this matters if your main character isn't Iconic and BOY IS HE EVER. Ash is an awesome...cleche character but he works. He's cleche because the moment you see him you KNOW he's going to be the only guy that lives and YOU KNOW he's the "Hero" in the film simply because of the way they have him being the first guy to leave the film for a while and last guy back but..what ever.

As I've pointed out there was lots of great things in the film,wither it's the atmosphere, Great characters or just plain fun black humour, but there where a couple downers. Probably only one that was major and that was this whole Scene where you see A character, Cheryl, leaves the cabin to go investigate some strange sounds she heard outside of the Cabin. and upon investigating she gets raped....by trees...Okay...not only is this..disturbing maybe it's just plain dumb and cheesy but it's Memorable for all the wrong reasons. It's so usurped of an idea that you'll remember it but at the same time it's so..tasteless it's borderline misogynistic. I remember watching it myself and I was so...turned off by the scene that I was happy when it ended. It felt so out of place in the film and in all honesty felt..tacked on or something meaning it was added because the film makers knew it would help sell the film (A rape scene in a horror film How Cleche) THANK GOD The director has since regretted filming that scene. Thankfully it doesn't ruin the film it just leaves us with an uncomfortable memory.

I guess if I WAS to add a downer it would be then ending. It's to Cleche. Character has won and walks off into the sun rise Whooppie who cares. in honesty if the film had ended that way and had not had a sequel I would've been VERY disappointed but fortunitly it did have one which goes back to my Cleche thing the sight of Ash walking away totally makes you know there's going to be a sequel(or they intended for one if the film didn't do well) Watching it I said to myself " saw this coming a mile away" but it didn't ruin the film for me it just..was predicable.

In closing this is a Classic horror that entertains us with it's mix of great Horror and great black humor. It also gives us another Memorable Character,Ash, for the genre.