A masterpiece that lives up to its tag-line!

Rating: 10/10 (31 July 2009)

The tag-line for THE EVIL DEAD - the ultimate experience in grueling terror - is genuinely lived up to.
Having seen the sequel, EVIL DEAD 2, before this one and laughing hard at its light-hearted intentionally comical nature, I was completely unprepared for what awaited me when I popped the video tape of THE EVIL DEAD into my VCR player all those years ago.
There is an ongoing polarising debate about what makes a good horror movie - supernatural horror or gore. Sam Raimi sweeps away the false choice by taking both elements and elevating them to extreme proportions to bring an ultimate terrifying nightmare you will absolutely never forget.
Sam Raimi took a budget that would seem tiny even by the standards of Hammer horror movies and produced a true horror masterpiece that pushes the boundaries of cinema like never before. Wearing its NC-17 rating like a badge of honour, it truly gives no quarter and takes no prisoners. It makes its sequels, EVIL DEAD 2 and ARMY OF DARKNESS, look like Disney movies in comparison.
THE EVIL DEAD is one of 74 entries on the DPP (now CPS) video nasties list and it's the best by far.
The simple plot of five travellers taking a trip to the woods and unknowingly unleashing demons seems very formulaic these days. But I'm telling you the rip-offs and stealth remakes are merely swimming in the wake of this classic original.
The small cast works wonders in this movie. These young people are easy to relate to. They are likable. They enjoy having fun. They like to tell jokes. They show love and affection for each other. As such, we feel for them when they are picked off one-by-one.
The demons in this movie are also proper antagonists. They are not Hollywood villains who you can negotiate with or shoot with a machine gun if they annoy you too much. They are genuinely ugly, horrific, inexplicable abominations prepared resort to emotionally cruel subterfuge to achieve their evil objectives. You can bash them over the head a dozen times. You can shoot them in the face with a shotgun. You can even poke their eyes out. But they keep coming for you until you've literally chopped off their every limb.
The special effects here are funded on microscopic budgets compared to Hollywood blockbusters. Yet there is no Hollywood movie I could name where you literally see demons decay bit-by-bit inside and outside for several minutes, bits of flesh shriveling up like screwed up paper, skulls exploding, blood emitting steam as it oozes out, demons biting their own hands off and faces pierced with shotgun shells like a dart piercing a dartboard.
The camera work and sound effects allow Raimi to exploit to the fear of the unknown to the absolute maximum. You know there's a demon there, yet you can't see it. A simple effect of a camera mounted on top of a motorbike combined with excellent sound effects and jarring music chords literally, and I mean literally, scares the living daylights out of you the first time you see and hear it.
The acting is superb as well.
Bruce Campbell plays the role he was born to play as Ash Williams. He is not the stereotypical muscle-bound Hollywood or the James Bond-type hero with nerves of steel. He's an ordinary guy just as freaked out as the audience. He literally is overwhelmed at what is happening. He's watched his friends die. He's even had to kill his girlfriend to defend himself. He tries to avoid believing what he's seeing is true. He shakes like hell as he tries to barricade himself into the cabin. He can't hide forever. Sooner or later he has to face up the demons. When he does he accidentally becomes a hero - one who returns in two sequels.
Ellen Sandweiss also delivers a highly underrated performance as Cheryl. The events that bestow her character are unlike anything seen in movies before this. You feel her fear, her anger, her disgust and shock from the ultimate violation. This is what proper horror is about.
This is a dangerous movie to watch from a personal perspective because once you've seen it, you might never see other horror movies in the same light again. I mean that literally.
Overall, THE EVIL DEAD is a true masterpiece of low-budget movie production. It's easily the best of the video nasties and a must-see for all fans of the genre.