Ah, the Sam Raimi-ness of it all

Rating: 8/10 (30 May 2009)

Sam Raimi's booga-booga-booga approach to horror film-making is on glorious display here, with lots of smash zooms, grotesque corpses and assorted awful fluids and maggots flung into someone's face. He is the master. Eli Roth cannot carry Sam's lunch.
Some thoughts:
-- Alison Lohman does a fine job in the lead. But I think Ellen Page, who turned down the role, would have been even better. Watch "Hard Candy" if you disagree.
-- Raimi must have searched the world over to find a kitten with extra cuteness for the movie's most controversial, but also one of the funniest, scenes.
-- OMG, that stupid-looking goat.
-- The scene at the gypsy funeral with the body crashing on top of our heroine, and then LEAKING INTO HER MOUTH. Funniest thing I've seen all year.
-- Lohman's chops on full display when she vents her rage in the graveyard scene. Whoa.
-- The floating guy at the seance? Not scary, just dumb.
-- The bloody nose scene. It's a gusher! Kleenex please! -- I was waiting to see if Raimi would cop out at the end. No he doesn't. Heh heh.
BTW, never let an old gypsy lady pull a button off your coat.