The Evil Dead has seen many releases on
Home Video, (which are talked about in the terrific booklet for the
DVD) but none as anticipated as this new release which features the
DVD in packaged in a replica of the original Book Of The Dead designed by
the original artist, Tom Sullivan. It features a sculpted cover with a
terrific 24 page booklet.In
1981, two high school friends cum University of Michigan college
students and a small film crew headed out to the backwoods of Tennessee
to shoot a project tentatively titled The Book of the Dead. The
fledgling filmmakers took a total budget of $50,000 and a 66-page script
and transformed them, through intense devotion, startling inventiveness,
and a little bit of blind luck, into one of the screen's most beloved
and respected horror films. Eventually spawning two sequels, Sam Raimi
and Bruce Campbell's The Evil Dead was the first chapter
in the (mis)adventures of the reluctant hero Ash and his war with the
horrible Deadites and the ancient book that unleashed them. The film is
a melange of Romero's Night of the Living Dead and
Friedkin's Exorcist, with a smattering of European visual
style a la Bava and Argento -- a mixture which congeals to form
something entirely unique and totally captivating.
The film begins with Ashley (Campbell), his girlfriend Linda (Betsy
Baker), sister Cheryl (Ellen Sandweiss), and their two friends Scotty
(Hal Delrich) and Shelly (Sarah York) en route to a small out-of-the-way
cabin nestled in the woodlands of Tennessee for a weekend of relaxation.
Little do they realize, the cabin is also the spot where a professor and
his wife sequestered themselves while the man of science delved into the
occult, translating the ancient Sumerian text of the Book of the Dead
-- a vile tome, inked in blood, delineating the steps to open a gateway
to another plane of existence. Settling in, the teenagers investigate
their temporary home for the weekend only to find the professor's tape
recorded translations of the book which, in typical fashion, they play,
unwittingly releasing an ancient evil tied to the woods themselves. One
by one, the evil possesses the teens, turning them into hideous,
blood-crazed Deadites hell-bent on the destruction of the living. Ash is
forced to fight for his life against the shells of the beings he once
knew as lover, family and friends.
The Evil Dead is a mind-numbing excursion into relentless
horror which, at first glance, may appear as little more than a nonstop
gorefest (which it is, to an extent), but the way in which it was
presented elevates the film above the average splatter fare. Raimi's
hyperkenetic visual style and bizarre, avant-garde approach to
translating concept into image imbue the film with a surreal atmosphere
-- which works extremely well within the confines of the narrative --
pushing the final product out of the mainstream into another aspect of
film entirely. Evil Dead is like the prose of William
Burroughs trapped in celluloid -- Beat poetry in motion. Call it what
you will -- avant-garde, surrealist, or dadaist filmmaking -- what
appears on the screen is uniquely personal and 100% Raimi.
Bruce Campbell seems to have been born to play the part of Ash. His
approach to acting is as unique as Raimi's behind the lens. His style is
so direct and convincing that the viewer is immediately struck not only
by his overwhelming ability as an actor but by his devotion and
willingness to give everything he has to achieve his goals. While
viewing the film, it's obvious the guy was put through hell during
filming -- an assumption the cast and crew have only reinforced over the
years during interviews. One anecdote made by Josh Becker (sound
engineer) was that to get into character, Campbell, while working in the
unheated cabin during one of the most frigid winters Tennessee had ever
seen, would take a spray bottle full of ice-cold water and spray, "like
a pint of water up each nostril. This would really get him into
character; once he did that, he didn't care what he did."* Campbell is,
in my opinion, the absolute best action/adventure/horror star the cinema
has ever seen -- easily surpassing the "efforts" of Hollywood's top box
office draws in both style and believability -- whether as the
bewildered hero of the Evil Dead Trilogy or the gun-toting
Renaissance man of the late, lamented Brisco County, Jr.,
Campbell can do it all and do it extremely w |
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