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EVIL DEAD

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CHAPTER I

ORIENTATION

Evil Dead is a 2013 American horror film co-written and

directed by Fede Alvarez.  It is the fourth installment of the Evil

Dead franchise, serving as both a reboot and a loose continuation of

the series; the first was not directed by Sam Raimi. The film had its

world premiere at the South by Southwest festival on March 8,

2013. This film was acted by Jane Levy (Mia), Shiloh Fernandez

(David), Lou Taylor Pucci (Eric), Elizabeth Blackmore (Natalie),

and Jessica Lucas (Olivia).

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CHAPTER II

INTERPRETATIVE RECOUNT

After being captured in the woods, an injured girl is

restrained in a basement with many people present. Upon revealing

she is demonically possessed, her father, Harold, sets her on fire

and shoots her dead.

Sometime later, Mia, her brother David, their friends Eric

and Olivia, and David's girlfriend, Natalie, arrive at an old cabin,

remote cabin in the woods where they plan to help Mia recover

from heroin addiction. A foul stench leads them to the cellar, where

they discover rotting animal corpses, a double-barreled shotgun and

a book titled Naturom Demonto, a Sumerian variation of the Book of

the Dead. Ignoring warnings scrawl on the book's pages, Eric reads

a passage aloud, summoning a demon. Believing that there is

something coming after her, Mia pleads to leave, but the group

refuses, believing she’s suffering from withdrawal. 

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Feeling betrayed, she hijacks the group's car and head out on

her own, but when a demonic version of Mia appears it causes her

to steer into a flooded ditch which disables the car. Returning to the

cabin on foot, she gets entangled in a cluster of vines that become

animated and rape her. After the rape, David and Olivia find Mia

and take her back to the cabin. Mia tells David that whatever

attacks her in the woods is in the cabin with them, but he doesn't

believe her. After returning to the cabin, the now fully possessed

Mia attacks both Olivia and David before passing out. The group

locks her in the cellar to contain her. The demon then possessed

Olivia, forcing her to mutilate her face with a broken shard of glass

and attacks Eric, who kills her in the ensuing struggle.

While David tend to Eric's wounds in a shed next to the

cabin, a crying Mia lures Natalie into the cellar, managing to bite

her hand before she flee back upstairs. Eric does some research in

the book, and learns that it prophesies that a demon called the

Taker of Souls must consumed five souls in order to unleash a

being called the Abomination. Meanwhile in the kitchen, Natalie's

bite wound begin to infect and corrode her hand and rapidly spread

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onto her arm, leading her to sever it with an electric knife before it

could reach her torso. David and Eric tend to Natalie's wounds, and

then discuss their next move. Eric explains that Mia must be

"purified" via burning, live burial, or dismemberment, which would

end her possession and hopefully end the demon's assault.

Suddenly, a possessed Natalie attacks them with a nail gun and a

crowbar. David blew off Natalie's other arm with the shotgun, and

the demon left her body as she bleeds to death.

Coming up with a plan, David leaves a heavily injured Eric

by the car while he plans to knock out Mia and buries her alive.

David then injects Mia with tranquilizers to completely render her

unconscious while he put her in a shallow grave next to the cabin.

After she died, he digs her up and uses an improvised defibrillator

to revive her; the demon has been exorcised,  and she is human

again. Returning to the cabin to get the keys to his Jeep, David is

attacked and mortally wounded by Eric, who was now possessed.

David locks Mia out of the cabin, engaging Eric by himself. Eric

taunts David about the Abomination's imminent arrival. David is

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responded by using the shotgun to ignite a nearby gasoline can,

engulfing the cabin in flames and killing them both.

Since five souls have now technically been taken, the

prophecy has been fulfilled. Blood rain from the sky as the

Abomination rises from hell, out of the ground, and chases Mia.

After a protracted showdown that results in the loss of her hand,

Mia manages to kill the Abomination by splitting it in half

vertically with a chainsaw, upon which the Abomination sink back

into the ground. The blood rain stop and Mia, hardened by the

events of the night, walked away into the forest. The Naturom

Demonto lies on the ground nearby, unscathed by the cabin fire, and

slammed shut on its own.

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CHAPTER III

EVALUATION

Most of you have read and re-read the basic framework of the

story: Mia (Jane Levy) was brought to a remote, family owned

cabin by a group of friends Eric played by Lou Taylor Pucci, Olivia

played by Jessica Lucas and Natalie played by Elizabeth

Blackmore) and her wayward brother (David, played by Shiloh

Fernandez) to help her break a heroin habit. They stumble upon the

Necronomicon and through a series of poor choices; call forth a

vengeful demonic force that wreaks all manner of havoc on the

group. This simple plot framework, I think actually works in a

stronger way than just a recreational trip into the woods. I felt this

was smart in terms of a plot device and works well as a reoccurring

reference point once things start to go downhill.

At the start, we’re thrown into the middle of a scenario

where a teenage girl is being pursued by a group of people intent on

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capturing her and ridding her of the demon. The visuals are really

good and the cinematography is excellent but it is confusing to try

to figure out when this might be happening, what the

circumstances are, etc. It felt uneven. On the one hand, it was

arresting to have to watch a family destroy the living body of their

loved one but on the other hand we don’t know these people so the

impact isn’t felt as strongly as it was intended. 

The craft of the film as a whole is quite remarkable. I’ve

talked about the effects and the shooting style (with loving but

merely slight nods to the board-cam style of Sam Raimi in the

original) which are strong and confident and keep the pace strong

from start to end. There is also a crafty play against our

expectations of jumps and scares at times that renders you

unsteady, anxious. It is brilliant and utilizes the preconceived

expectations of the audience against them.

I think it is important to point out a few other aspects of the

production that were impressive:

For one, the art direction was nothing short of perfect. It

would have been so easy, so easy to just dress the cabin and area

like 10,000 other horror movies and call it a day but they really took

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that part seriously and made the surrounding forest its own

character, the cabin a real thing. They don’t overdo the props and

they take advantage of every opportunity to add grit to everything

without making it look like a soundstage all dolled up.

For another, the score is a thing of beauty. Roque Baños has

crafted a steady, ballsy collection of music that dances around the

scenes in always the right way. There is a delicate timber to some

parts, a frantic static and crash to others but it all adds up to a very

dynamic piece of music that fits beautifully with everything

Alvarez is doing on screen.

Finally, the performance by Jane Levy as Mia is just

absolutely good. Watching her go from victim of drugs to dote

upon loved one to unsteady addict to violent demon is nothing

short of fantastic. The commitment to every stage is perfect.

Perfect. She just owns the role in every way that matters and makes

us invest in her survival. You really don’t have a choice. She could

not have done a better job – mucking through water and mud and

blood and all else to produce an iconic.

So, this was an utterly grand bit of filmmaking. While the

early stages suffered from some chunkiness, the film as a whole is a

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victory in that it delivers on the promise of living up to the legacy

of the original. It does not let you down, it does not disappoint.

This bloody, intense chapter in the Evil Dead legacy is not only a

worthy addition to that group but stands alone as one of the best

remake/re imaginings I’ve seen in many years. Hat is off to all

involved and here’s hoping it brings some serious dollars at the box

office. We all need more of Evil Dead’s intensity and creativity in

the horror genre’ and since money talks, we as a fan base need to do

a lot of talking about this one. Get out and see it as soon as you’re

able.

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REFERENCES

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1288558/ 

http://www.horror-movies.ca/evil-dead-2013-review/