Following a trend of remakes, Evil Dead makes this list after a long and hard negotiations. This remake has been in the works for the long time, and fans prevented it from happening around 2007, but now everything is set for yet
another remake of a classical trilogy. Although I think that the original Evil Dead [1981] got his remake with the Evil Dead 2 [1987], it seems to be more room to experiment with this story. At least Sam Reimi along with Bruce Campbell will be overseeing the whole thing. So lets go over the facts first and I will rant about this a bit later: Fede Alvarez is the director, and it seems that this is his first feature film so we’re all hoping that he can do a proper job (almost impossible). The thing that kick-started this whole project is the script written by Diablo Cody (Juno, Jennifer’s Body, Young Adult). She said the movie is going to be unbelievably violent (yeah right) with a few twists to the original story. The next is the cast consisting of relatively unknown actors: Jane Levy (Shameless, Suburgatory) took the lead after Lily Collins dropped out, and helping her deal with the Evil Dead is Shiloh Fernandez (Red Riding Hood) . Here’s the rest of the cast: Lou Taylor Pucci, Elizabeth Blackmore and Jessica Lucas.
And now let us dissect this whole thing starting with the director Fede Alverez. After a couple of short films he landed this huge enterprise and this reminds me of Neill Blomkamp and Peter Jackson with their movie District 9 that also featured a young director with a vision, so I am not going to dismiss him yet. Next we have the writer Diablo Cody (I guess her parents were from South Korea), and as much as I liked her two movies Juno and Young Adult, Jennifer’s body was one of the worst movies I have seen. It presents everything that is wrong with movie industry with just the hints of campiness and comedy, and this is the first red light… If they are trying to create a movie with that vibe that would be truly horrible, to create a milking and commercial suck up abomination just to get more cash. As far as the actors go, I guess they are alright, the first Evil Dead also featured an almost amateur cast, and I guess that is the part that I like in this remake. Don’t worry Ash will be still in the movie, but only as a cameo role. The story remains the same, a bunch of kids go into a cabin into woods and wake up ancient evil that lurks in the woods by reading passages from the book of the dead.
I can’t believe that I’m saying this but they can take hints from the The Thing [2011] prequel that was made by people who really (I mean really) loved the original and used similar special effects (toned down CGI) and try to create about the same vibe. The things that made Evil Dead so great are phenomenal and innovative camera work by Sam Reimi, a likable kickass lead role, the scary, chilling atmosphere that easily can change into a lighter mood, the amounts of gore and innovative and painful scenes of death and mayhem…(and I could go on and on…). I guess that viewed from this perspective the effects look a bit outdated (at least some of them), so there is that motive to do a remake, but that’s about it. What else they could do better? Acting? Camera work? I am so afraid that this is just another attempt to get the fans excited and create enough hype to make a bit more money and then flush the movie down the toilet. If they fuck this up they deserve a pencil in the ankle!