Drag Me to Hell
2009 · Directed by Sam Raimi
Original language: English
- horror
- thriller
The story
After denying a woman the extension she needs to keep her home, loan officer Christine Brown sees her once-promising life take a startling turn for the worse. Christine is convinced she's been cursed by a Gypsy, but her boyfriend is skeptical. Her only hope seems to lie in a psychic who claims he can help her lift the curse and keep her soul from being dragged straight to hell.
What it’s like
Hard-edged, kinetic horror with a grubby, lived-in look: bright office fluorescents and washed-out daylight give way to murky, shadowy rooms, and the camera lurches and swoops with restless energy, whipping around corners and pushing in on faces until the frame feels crowded. Its palette leans on dull browns, grey parking lots and sickly greens, punctuated by sudden bursts of saturated colour in the blood and bile. Sound does much of the work: loud stingers, creaking doors, squelching effects and a bombastic orchestral score that swells at each jolt. The vibe is manic, darkly comic dread, the sort of ride that keeps you laughing nervously at its own excess. Pacing is brisk and escalating, with a stubborn, capable heroine slowly getting more desperate and more ruined. Violence is frequent and often grotesque: gore, bodily fluids, and graphic physical injury, though it stays cartoonish rather than bleak. It suits a loud, late-night scare with friends or a Halloween-season watch. Best for people who want jump scares, gross-out practical effects and a playful, over-the-top nastiness, not anything gentle or quiet.
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