Evil Dead
2013 · Directed by Fede Álvarez
Original language: English
- horror
The story
Mia, a drug addict, is determined to kick the habit. To that end, she asks her brother, David, his girlfriend, Natalie and their friends Olivia and Eric to accompany her to their family's remote forest cabin to help her through withdrawal. Eric finds a mysterious Book of the Dead at the cabin and reads aloud from it, awakening an ancient demon. All hell breaks loose when the malevolent entity possesses Mia.
What it’s like
Harsh, grimy and saturated: the 2013 remake of Evil Dead is lit like a nightmare that never switches off, with sickly green and bruised blue cast over a rotting woodland cabin, slick black blood, and a wet, grinding sound design that makes every creak feel like a threat. Fede Álvarez favours restless handheld movement, sudden whip pans and long single takes that lock you inside the cramped rooms with the characters, while the score is a low, droning throb broken by shrieks and abrupt silences. The mood is relentless dread that tips into outright grue, a grim, claustrophobic sit with little relief between set pieces. Violence is frequent, graphic and gory: dismemberment, self-harm, stabbing and gallons of gore, with sexual content absent but drug use and cruelty central to the premise. It suits a late-night watch with the lights off, not a gentle evening, and is for viewers who want extreme, unflinching body horror and the thrill of a siege-style survival chase.
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