The Evil Dead (1981) Review

The Evil Dead (1981) Review

Certain horror movies, for whatever reason, manage to achieve wide recognition with audiences. Generally speaking, the genre has its devoted collection of viewers, but also has an equally dedicated group that refuse to watch anything of the sort. When I think of widely-acclaimed horror films, meaning ones that everyone has seen, whether they are fans of horror or not, I think of films likes Jaws, The Exorcist, Alien, and The Silence of the Lambs. In terms of horror films acclaimed within the circles of horror fans, The Evil Dead series has to be one of the definitive examples. 

When the original The Evil Dead first premiered at Cannes Film Festival, a certain real-life horror icon was in the audience: Stephen King. By that time, he was already famous within the horror community, and gave the movie huge support, later claiming it was one of his favourite horror films, and calling it the “most ferociously original film of the year”, which was used heavily in the marketing. If your movie is beloved by King, then you’ve already succeeded, as far as I’m concerned. 

For those who don’t know, The Evil Dead is about a group of college kids who go out to a remote cabin in the woods, where they discover The Book of the Dead, and unleash evil spirits that terrorize them. It’s a simple premise with a straight-forward delivery, but within the details of what happens is where the ingenuity and terror lies. 

So what’s the reason The Evil Dead never became as widely accepted as something like Jaws or Alien or Exorcist? It’s hard to say, but ultimately, I’d say it was just too niche. It’s an extremely particular blend of campiness, scariness, and fun, with a distinct low-budget look and feel you don’t get from a more polished studio film. Horror-comedy is not easy to do, let alone do extremely well. Sam Raimi, the mastermind behind The Evil Dead, knew he could make the audience scared to a point, but could also afford to invoke laughter by going over the top, whether in levels of gore or with the concepts themselves. This is more evocative of later entries, but it’s present in the original, too. 

The Evil Dead has so many memorable and inventive moments. By the time I got around to seeing it, I had already seen many of the horror classics, including the aforementioned Exorcist, which is often cited as being the prime example of a horror movie doing things no other movie had done before. But, in its own way, The Evil Dead accomplishes the same thing. Sure, it’s much cheaper-looking and less believable, but no less scary. It comes down mainly to the direction from Sam Raimi. He uses so many creative camera tricks, from the famous roving POV shot to extreme close-ups of faces at tilted angles, and of course all the effects shots. 

The effects are a huge part of the appeal. There’s something about possessed people with blank white eyes that always disturbs me. I was disturbed by it in The Exorcist, and I was disturbed by it again in The Evil Dead. This movie obviously owes quite a bit to The Exorcist, what with it being similar in the premise of possession, but unlike The Exorcist, it goes all out with gore and violence, and becomes its own thing entirely. 

I don’t really need to say much more about The Evil Dead. If you haven’t seen it, then see it. Even though the series has been going on for decades, and there are bigger-budgeted entries in the series with better effects and acting and production values, the stitched-together look and feel of the original will never be duplicated, and should never be overlooked. It’s a timeless piece of horror entertainment. 

Related: 

Top Ten Low Budget Horror Films: http://cccmovies.blogspot.com/2017/10/top-ten-low-budget-horror-films-ccc.html

 

Top Ten Movies That Scared the Shit Out of Me: http://cccmovies.blogspot.com/2017/06/top-ten-movies-that-scared-shit-out-of.html