Another bad review!

Rating: 1/10 (18 April 2013)

Oh wow! I've never in my life been so unimpressed with a film after expectations. To get one thing straight, I was totally against the remake of THE Evil Dead from day one but come February this year a friend sent me a link to a teaser trailer...then a real trailer and I started thinking "wait a minute...this actually looks like it...might...possibly...be...good?!?!" Then I saw another trailer and started getting really excited. They looked like they'd genuinely made the film with a real love, understanding and loyalty to the original and suddenly I found myself genuinely looking forward to it. It was my birthday and dragged a few friends along with me to see it.
CONTAINS SPOILERS
Right from the off, I knew something was wrong. We seemed to be given some sort of exposition that while quite intriguing in a "I want to be a Sam Raimi film" sort of a way, didn't really add anything to the original plot. Then we meet the five teenagers after a most likely expensive helicopter tracking shot through the trees which gets away from the frightening, claustrophobic introduction of the original and instantly distances you from the actors. All five come across as annoying, stereotypical and one dimensional. None of them are drawn in interesting ways or with any degree of depth. One even moans that she "looks like road kill" when clearly she's dolled up and looks pretty stunning (especially for a drug addict as she's meant to be). We're also introduced to a sixth member of the party...a dog! His only function is to find the trapdoor to the cellar where the book of the dead and other such artefacts are. One can't help but wish they'd have left the dog at home, not found the trapdoor and the film have just been a drama about the lead girl getting over her drug addiction with her friends crumbling around her and struggling to help her whilst bickering with each other.
One of the characters decides it is a good idea to read aloud from the book despite the warnings IN THE ACTUAL BOOK telling him not to do it. I'm not kidding, they literally do say not to read any of it aloud!!! Then we proceed to the tree rape made so famous by the original, and here marred and ruined by bad CGI effects that wouldn't look out of place in an anime series. From this point onwards we're "treated" to various scenes that seem to plod along at an alarmingly boring pace which just keeps you thinking, "hmmm...why didn't they just do what they did in the original?" Everything seems to have been...not so much tamed down as simply watered down. It's as if they decided they wanted to make a really gruesome film and then at last minute just thought, actually let's not bother. It is similar to the Nightmare on Elm St remake in terms of the theory of 30 years after the original with so many more resources and a higher budget at the film-makers disposal, why do they just resort to Freddy simply 'stabbing' his victims? Where's the originality? Where's the THOUGHT? It isn't until one of the characters cuts her arm off due to it being infected (obviously a nod to ED2) that I thought to myself, "at last, something ballsy!" but then we get back down to the pathetic trickle trickle trickle of the dull and lifeless excuse of a plot.
The film's main issues are that there isn't really a start, middle and end. It just seems to be a bunch of stuff that happens at various intervals without picking up any momentum. Also, as much as it tries to offend or disgust with all of it's tongue slicing, arm tearing and nail gun firing, it just isn't effective. It isn't until the last 15 minutes when we're treated to a good old bit of chainsaw wielding carnage that anything remotely viscerally exciting happens, and even that is overshadowed by the fact that the character using the chainsaw seems to be far from concerned about the injury they've just sustained, by all accounts shouldn't be alive, shouldn't be able to talk and should be covered in blisters from an earlier encounter with a boiling hot shower. Also we never fully understand who or what it is that she is attacking the chainsaw with and by this point...who really cares?
I have honestly NEVER been so disappointed with a film in my life. This is not a harsh exaggeration. This is a genuine feeling of hatred for a film I believe to be worse than the Nightmare on Elm St and The Fog remakes combined!
Oh, and it's THE Evil Dead, not Evil Dead. The film-makers couldn't even get that right...and Ash's cameo after the credits honestly isn't worth sticking round for!