Truly Disturbing

Rating: 10/10 (22 August 2000)

Of all the words in the english language, disturbing is the best to describe Sam Raimi's cult horror classic. The setup is simple enough; five friends rent a cabin in the woods and are attacked by evil spirits that inhabit bodies and go on a killing rampage, but it is on this seemingly cliche premise that Raimi builds a horror masterwork. Evil Dead delivers in every aspect that you would expect of a horror movie and a few that are surprising. While Evil Dead has mounds upon mounds of gore, billions of "jump moments", and other standard horror movie fare, it also builds genuine suspense. Also the standard horror fare is top-shelf. The Gore is frightening and not just sickening, the jump moments are perfectly timed and really make you jump. Furthermore there is a sense of humanity faced with the unspeakable. As a detatched viewer, you yell at the screen for Ash (Bruce Campbell) to take action, but you realize that faced with that situation you too would be frozen in horror. Raimi does an excellent job of drawing his audience into the action with heavy doses of point of view shots and close ups that seem to bounce toward and away from the character. These techniques are used with great success (and ripped off in the recent Blair Witch Project). While the end may not be as satisfying as one would hope, any ending to this wonderfully horrible ordeal is a happy one. I would like to end by saying that I am not a fan of the horror movie genre. I find films like the Elm Street, Friday 13th, and Scream series to be highly stupid, but this movie is genuinely terrifying. Recommended for those who really want to be scared and have a strong stomach