I do not consider this review to have any major spoilers. Nothing I discuss in depth happens after the first 20 or so minutes of the film. These details are also not a surprise to anyone who has a passing familiarity with The Evil Dead franchise.
Though her name doesn’t appear in the actual credits of the film, Academy Award-winning screenwriter Diablo Cody’s work on the remake of Evil Dead is easily felt. Structurally, it’s one of the tightest horror film screenplays in recent memory. Everything is layered in from the start to create a strong sense of believability in the over the top paranormal mayhem to come. There are even times where her masterful use of slang and pop culture references are allowed through unfiltered. Who else would have college students sincerely use the phrase “bump uglies” in a horror movie?
After a brutal flashback demonstrating one way to eliminate the scourge of the Necronomicon, we jump to five college students arriving at a remote cabin in the woods. They are there to help their friend Mia (a masterful performance by Jane Levy) detox from a nasty drug addiction. Mia complains about a nasty smell for hours and is ignored until her brother David finds the source. The basement is filled with rotting animals, blood, and a book sealed in barbed wire. The friends have unwittingly woken up the evil of the Necronomicon. Now they are in a fight for their lives against a scourge that will stop at nothing to claim them all.
The original The Evil Dead film is a campy schlock horror masterpiece. It’s filled with disturbing imagery and really shocking plot twists that still hold up today. It was actually remade with a slightly higher budget as the first act of The Evil Dead 2, an interesting spin on horror sequels that has not been replicated with anywhere near the same level of success since.
The strength and, sadly, greatest flaw of the film is the new drug addiction angle. As Mia begins to suffer from withdrawal symptoms, her friends refuse to believe anything she says. Olivia, a registered nurse who is leading the detox, warns everyone that Mia will say and do anything to go back home and use again. Even when Mia swears there is a strange woman in the woods and a tree attacked her, no one believes her.
But, that level of distrust is not wielded as effectively as it could be. Mia is the perfect unreliable narrator for the story. She’s flipping out over every imagined slight against her. She begins to behave in irrational ways, walking in circles in the rain and jumping out of windows. Yet the film doesn’t trust us enough to let the ambiguity linger once the book is in play. There is a clear shot of Eric, a school teacher, unwrapping the Necronomicon and invoking the spell that seals their fate. From there, we know every bad thing that happens is a result of the book, not Mia’s withdrawal symptoms.
That missed opportunity does make it seem like a very strong new concept for the series is just tacked on to be different. The results are too layered throughout the film to just be posturing of originality, but in the moment it seems ineffective. The film does regain its footing but there was no need to stumble at all. A moment of disconnect in a horror film can spell disaster by way of a lost audience. Evil Dead does enough to overcome this but should have been so much stronger than it is.
Rating: 7/10
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On American Dad!, the gun is rarely a gun. In one episode, where Roger the alien demands a roast for his birthday then traps the Smith family in a revenge fantasy for hurting his feelings, a rare pair of scorpions are introduced during the second segment. They will eat the inside of the human body through whatever orifice they can enter. The scorpions accidentally enter Roger but then burrow their way out during the final few moments for grand comedic effect.
Right away, the characters try to sabotage each other to save their own fingers. When those efforts fail, they fake a mass murder/suicide to convince Francine to light up a cigarette to calm down. The director demands the contract be upheld and sets up an elaborate ritual to remove the finger. Expectedly, the family decides to offer their own fingers in place of Francine’s, ending the contract once and for all. The happily ever after is short-lived as Stan chops his own finger off so the family finally commits to something they agreed to do. It was totally unexpected and led to a dry joke about cartoon hands that ended the episode.
Writer/director Derek Cianfrance and screenwriters Ben Coccio and Darius Marder take a huge risk in The Place Beyond the Pines. It really is three separate films loosely linked by the chronology of core characters’ lives. The style of Luke’s story is different from the styles of Avery and the sons’ stories. Everything from the cinematography to the scoring changes to reflect a new direction in the film.
The final few minutes almost make you forget all the cliched high school drama the characters are put through to artificially raise the stakes at the end of the film. For the first time since Luke’s story, the characters behave in realistic ways. Genuine suspense builds as you don’t know how far the next generation will take the unresolved conflict 15 years in the making. It’s shockingly good considering the hour of pablum and well-worn tropes shoved in after Luke’s story.
Elizabeth is the type of strong female character we need more of onscreen. She has been victimized but she is no victim and no one will stop her from living her life how she chooses. One key scene later on, a montage of hypnotherapy patients, sees her take an entirely different approach to her calm and brutally efficient demeanor in her office. A domestic violence victim wants to leave her abuser. Dr. Lamb preaches to the rafters the hypnotic suggestions this woman needs to begin picking up the pieces and live her life again. Elizabeth’s experience with domestic abuse is handled delicately and actually enhances the overall narrative of high crime and psychology.