Army Of Darkness Review (1992)

The third, and (thus far) final film in Sam Raimi's epic Evil Dead trilogy comes to us in 1992 with the title Army Of Darkness. Bruce Campbell returns as the chainsaw wielding Ash, and the story picks up directly after the events of Evil Dead II. This is by far and away my least favorite of the Evil Dead films. It trades in gore, violence, and scares for some cheap thrills and laughs. I enjoyed some of the humor but not enough of it to make an entire film based off it. Evil Dead II was the perfect combonation, but by Army Of Darkness the series almost became pointless. I love the campyness of the film, some good laughs, decent effects (for the time), and some of the costumes are rather well done, I still enjoy the film, just not nearly as much as the others. There are currently talks of a sequel, or remake (or both), and either way, I'm pretty much there.

I Give Army Of Darkness:

3/5

The Thing Review (1982)

The Thing

A remake of the 1951 original, The Thing was helmed by director John Carpenter. This was his first big studio effort, with previous films including the original Assualt on Precint 13, and Halloween. Carpenter couldn't have picked a worse time to realese the film. As it was set, The Thing came out only two weeks after Steven Speilberg set out his own alien film, that one the hearts of moviegoers, and went on a box-office rampage, E.T.. Since then, critcs and audinces members have repented, and The Thing has become a much beloved cult classic, earinging its spot at #162 on IMDB.com's top 250 films of all time.

The plot is relativly simple, but creates for a very confusing story, that will keep you guessing all the way through. A group of scientific reasearchs are in a base in Antarctica to to some sort of study. While there we meet a whole cast of characeters, that are all very interesting and unique. The Norwegians from a nearby base begin to act strangly, and won't return calls. Pretty soon, the crew is sent to investigate, only to find that they have pulled something strange out of the ice. Once back at base, dogs begin to howl, and create very strange noises, only to have their heads explode, and turn into an octopuse creature shortly thereafter. Soon, this strange parasite has infected a few members of the crew. But the question is, who do they kill to find out?

Let's start this off by saying that John Carpenter is a master of his craft. He has proven to us that he can do suspense, and scary multiple times before, just look at his track record. He virtually is a tour de force in the name of horror. Once you have a title like Halloween under your belt, you have it made. There are a few things that I really enjoyed about his style this time around, and other things that I didn't. Firstly, since it had a bigger budget, we have better sets, and lighting, and camerawork. But the bigger budget also attributes to the loss of classic eariness, that comes through natural lighting, and home-brewed sound effects. Personally, I think Carpenter works best with a minimal budget, when he is forced to be created, but this certainly is one of his best big films.

A lot of The Things infamy comes from its gratuitous violence, and excellent special effects, which you can see displayed above. And I have to say, they are pretty amazing, especially for the time period. Most of the accolades for this great achivement can go to Roy Arbogast, the speical effects director. He created some truly horrifying and gruesome things for this film. I am really shocked that this wasn't nominated for more awards in effects departments. Not to mention, all of them are practical. Not one effect you see was done with a computer, which is something to marvel in itself.

The film has a fairly slender cast, with the only big name being Kurt Russel. He's a decent actor, in my opinion, and he continues his streak of decency throughout this film as well, neither here, nor there. The supporting cast does a great job for a group of relative unknowns, such as Wilford Brimley, T.K. Carter, and David Clennon. They round out a diverse cast of characters decently. But the problem is, since the film relies so much on what the characters say and do (because thats how we decided who we think is infected), I wish a better cast could have been attributed to a great idea.

Overall, The Thing is a fun movie. A nice little horror monster flick to watch inside on a wet day, or when you take a sick day. The film is disgusting in its violence. Gruesome in its gore. And unrelenting when it comes to special effects. It's an interesting idea, pulled off by a decent cast of people, and a decent directing job by John Carpenter, who is truly a master of suspence, and an excellent choice for the director of this film.

I Give The Thing:
Four Zombi's Out Of Five
(I seem to be giving that a lot lately)

Evil Dead II: Dead By Dawn Review (1987)

Evil Dead II: Dead By Dawn

Six years after the original film stormed the cinemas, Evil Dead 2 was realesed. The film was written and directed by the originals creator, and now legend, Sam Raimi, and was put into an even larger theatrical released, and was even reviewed by prominent film crtics. Among these were Roger Ebert who dared to give the gory horror film 3 our of 4 stars. Something most critics would have been afraid to do. This film, like the last has since become a cult hit. It's status has not yet reached that of the original, or of Army Of Darkness, but in my opinion surpasses both those films greatly

Evil Dead 2 opens up with a small recap of the events that happened in the previous film. They are altered slightly, such as it being just Ash and his girlfriend going up to the cabin, both those are easy to look past, and not care about. The sequel then picks up directly where the first one ended, with Ash in the puddle about to be consumed by the evil of the Necromonicon, the sun then begins to raise, and Ash notices that the evil begins to fade. Start sequel, which is even better than the first.

While the original film was a classic, and an original, and will never be touched in that sense, Evil Dead 2 is even better in my opinion. It adds more and more of what we loved about the first. There is even more blood in this one, as surprising as it sounds, and while the first one was mostly humorless, this one begins the start of the series being funny. Bruce Campbell reprises his role, as he rightly should have, and does a Bruce Campbell job in the role.

The acting in this film isn't that bad. It has about the same amount of characters as the first, maybe a little less. Ash is trapped in the cabin, until two FBI agents find him stranded there. Bruce Campbell does exactly what you'd expect him to do with the role, and I'm fine with that, as should everyone. Bruce Campbell became famous for this type of acting, and he does it marvelously. Everybody else does fine. There roles weren't written as anything special, and they aren't played that special.

Like I said before this film has an excellent amount of gore. And trust me, Sam Raimi can do gore well. It certainly shows here, with blood dripping from ceilings, coming out of bodies and everything inbetween. Raimi being as masterful as he is pulled off these effects quite nicely, not to mention lots of other effects, including flying through houses, walking trees, and giant whirlwinds. Not to mention this film has an awesome ending, which I won't spoil, but you probably already know about. The film is also genuinly funny, with Ash and the cast all performing funny dialouge very cleverly.

To sum up what I've previously written in five paragraphs, I simply loved Evil Dead 2. Sometimes, I appreciate watching movies on VHS. It adds a sense of nostalga to the expericence, of which you should already be having a handful. The film is funny, witty, and well written by mastreo Raimi. The gore is extreme and pulled off nicely, as is all of the numerous technical effects used in the film. The acting is what you'd expect, which is not much, but at least passable. Blood is plentiful, and the jokes are good, and that simply makes for a fun, entertaining film, and definatly a worthy sequel.

I Give Evil Dead 2: Dead By Dawn:
5 zombi's out of 5!

Drag Me To Hell Review (2009)

After taking a hiatus from horror movies, to work on the summer popcorn Spiderman franchise, Raimi decided to head back to his roots with Drag Me To Hell. But once you leave can you go back? Of course you can! In fact Ivan Raimi and Sam Raimi had written and talked about the film before Sam ditched to work on Spiderman. Its okay Sam, we forgive you. Raimi has stated that he wanted the film to be rated PG-13 on purpose. Saying that he didn't want the main appeal to be blood and gore, as he had done that before. Even though it does move away from the gore aspect we have come to know and love from Raimi, it still does deliver on subtle and dark humor. Casting Justin Long was a good start, but...I don't know, it seemed a little lack-lustery to me.

Raimi can continue to make horror movies if he likes, or he can continue to make Spiderman movies if he likes. It doesn't matter, the Spiderman movies obviously make tons of money, and Raimi does a great job directing them. When he does come back to horror though, he previous films have been a little shakey, The Gift, The Quick and The Dead, and Darkman all failed finacially at the box-office. However, with Drag Me To Hell having a budget of 30 million, and making 80 million, you can expect Raimi to Drag You To Hell Again

The plot is simple. A loan officer is competing for a managers position at the bank she is working at. Its down to her and another man named Stu (I think..?), later in her day, an eldery woman comes into the bank, wishing for an extension on her loan, even though the bank has already given her two extensions before. Wanting to impress her boss by showing him that she can make tough decisions, she decides to deny the old woman an extensions, thus foreclosing her home. As it turns out, this old woman is actually a hungarian gyspsy, and she decides that its time to use her gyspsy powers, and put a curse on this young girl. The curse lasts for three days, each day increasing in devilish torment, and on the fourth day, a spirit will come to take to burn in hell for all of eternity. Shit, now she actually has to do some work. I like the story, its quick, its easy, and its fun. Raimi always has a great eye for mythos and charaters and it definatly shows.

The acting in the film was decent at best. The main role of Christen Brown was played by newcomer Alison Lohman, she did an alright job, but she seemed almost too hollywood for my taste. Kind of typical auginu, but who knows, maybe I'm just a dick. But, I guess that Raimi had to take what he could get, when his original planned actess -Ellen Page, of Juno- dropped out due to a scheduling conflict, and I think that she would have done an excellent. Justin Long plays Christen's boyfriend, he was funny in the few scenes that he was in, but it was your regular boyfriend role where he said basically "I feel sorry for you, but I don't believe you!"

While the film was made to be a PG-13 movie, it did have quite a bit of blood and gore in it. Such as VERY killer nose-bleed, exploding eyes, and staplers to the face. So, that obviously mean that the movie tends to be a jump-scare based movie. I say this, because the MPAA gives R ratings to more mature movies with tension, because they usually deal with more mature subject matter, such as sex, and often have more language, and that is what Americans are afraid of and...ahhhh, I'll save this for some sort of topical rant.

For some reason, I felt that the pacing for this movie was off too. I don't know it it's just Raimi or what, but with both of the movies I've reviewed by him, the pacing just seems off. In this one it began pretty quick, then slowed way down, and then picked way up, and it was just strange. I don't know if it was the story, or the diolouge or whatever, it just bothered me. However, a positive of the movie was the effects. While the blood and gore described above were all done in classic on-set practical effects, while the other monsters and ghouls where done with CG, greenscreen, water puppets, and tons of other classic, and cool effect styles.

Overall, while Drag Me To Hell was better than a lot of your typical B-Movies, and a lot of popular horror films that have come out recently with the PG-13 rating, it still wasn't as good as I had hoped and expected. The acting wasn't that good, the pacing was off, and it seemed very rushed, and had a dissapointing ending, but great effects, and a cool main story save this movie from total destruction, while I hope that I don't get drug into seeing this again, it was better than actually getting dragged to hell.

3/5

The Evil Dead Review (1981)

The first film in Sam Raimi's classic evil dead series, the appropriatly titled The Evil Dead, it set out to be the ultimate experience in grueling horror. The film was made for only $375,000, and that meager budget almost went to waste, as the film was denied by nearly ever American and European distributor, for fear that it would be to controverisal. The film was only moderatly successful at the box-office, making about 2,500,000, now years later, the film has become one of the most refrenced, and cult followed film of all time.

Upon its inital realese, The Evil Dead was a very controverisal film. Not because of theme, or content, not for animal cruelty (Cannibal Holocaust*cough cough*) but for its excessive use of violence and gore. Before the rating was exhumed, The Evil Dead was given the coveted X rating. When it was re-submitted in 1994, it was rated NC-17.

When a group of five friends go out on a camping trip, lead friend Ash (played by the legendary Bruce Campbell) rents a cabin in the woods. Upon arriving, they find some very strange things, a log is oddly tied up and is being swung at the wall. Later, while sitting by the fire, another one of the friends find that the grandfather clock has mysteriously stopped, defying all possible acts of gravity. Looking around the cabin, Ash and Scott find a strange recording, and bring it upstairs, and decide to give it a play. Little do the unsuspecting teens know that they have just read a passage from the Necronomicon, or the Book of the Dead, and realese and unrelenting horde of EVILL!!

Firstly, lets talk about the actors and charecters in this movie. Every single charecter seems to be based on an actual archatype of some sort, and all of the actors pull it off very well. That being said, while the actors were there for principal photography, they all left (with the exception of Bruce Campbell) and they had to use bunches of fake actors as replacments. I'll just throw this in as part of this paragraph, that most of the sets, and the cabin, were excellently pulled off. Even though they looked good for a cheap budget, if it was a bigger budget, it wouldn't be as much as a surprise.

The story while simple, is still very fun to watch and intruging. However, I still think that the pacing was incredibly strange. The beggining is slow and somewhat boring, and it left way to much to be desired. At first it was like some sort of paranormal thriller, ghost story thing, which would have been kind of cool, and right with the pacing, but eventually when it cranks up the speed, it works as a zombie film, I just thought that it was weird.

The blood and gore in this film is AMAZING! Its a classic film for that reason, and it certainly deserves it. There is literal moments where blood is just pouring out of pipes, and running down projectors. Its the simple recipe that you can make at home, Karo Corn Syrup, and Red Food Coloring. Now this may seem like nothing, but when you see it all come together at the end, with the classic uses and techniques. And again with the budget, but for a miniscule budget it still makes things even better. Also, it has some natural scares that were really fun. The laughing baby doll zombie that sits in the doorway was just creepy!

Overall The Evil Dead is an amazing film that holds up incredibly well. It is better than most stuff that comes out nowadays, and was probobaly better than most things that had come out during that time. The gore, acting, and story was amazing. But for some reason the pacing just really annoyed me, I don't know if it was because I just wasn't in the mood or what. The ending was also cool. So The Evil Dead was pretty awesome and gets:

4/5

The Nin9s Review (2007)

As much as it pains me to say this...I really like a movie with Ryan Reynolds. And this is the movie. Now, usually I don't really like Reynolds (damn you X-Men Origins, you fucked up Deadpool so bad!) But The Nin9s was simply fantastic. It was created by then first time writer and director John August. I hope to see a lot more of this guy in years to come. Now, before this thing gets going, I'm gonna warn you. The Nin9s does have some creepy elements to it, but it is defiantly no a full fleged horror film. So if you're expecting to be scared out of your mind...sorry.

While the film has a lot of big names attachted to it, including Reynolds, Mellisa McCarthy, and Hope Davis, the film mostly traveled festivals before dissapearing. Once these starts reached critical level, the film was realesed to DVD in hopes of cashing in on their success. And it probably did. I hate it when studios realese old films based on an actors recent success, much like what they are doing with Robert Patteson, and Ellen Page, it just seems cheap, and makes you feel that the actors aren't that good. I happen to come across this film through my brother.

The Nin9s story is very confusing. Coveluted? No. But radically different, yet dramatically gifted. The film itself is basically three short storys, all featuring the same actors, playing differnt roles. All of these storys interconnect as the film moves down its path, and ultimatly form an unsettling, and somewhat dissapointing conclusion. The ending is unexpected and shocking, but a little anti-climactic.

When I said this film had its creepy moments, I definatly meant it. One scene inparticular made me have goosebumps. For reasons to long to explain here, a main charecter ends up having a baby moniter in his house, used to hear a baby while its sleeping. Through the moniter comes the following phrases.

The Duck Says: Quack Quack Quack
The Pig Says: Oink Oink Oink
The Rooster Says: Gobble, Gobble Gobble
The Cow Says: [insert creepy voice of choice]: Nines Nines Nines Nines Nines Nines Nines Nines Nines Nines
I really liked this scene, and many other similair to it. John August had talent both as a writer and a director, being able to pull of horror drama and comedy all within this tight laced film.

The acting was excellent by all. I really enjoyed the performances by Melissa McCarthy and Ryan Reyonlds. I felt they both did an excellent job with and excellent script, all while having to perform for many characters. I didn't really like Hope Davis, but that is probably because I didn't like her characters, which was most likely intentional.

I won't spend to much time on this review since it really isn't horror film, but I thought I should inform those of you who read, about an excellent, under-hyped film that no one really talks about. Overall, The Nin9s is fun, thought-provoking, well written, performed excellently, and created with the utmost perfection. The Nin9s recives...

5/5





P.S. when I was googling pics for this, this is what happened in my search results.
of about 97,600 for the nin9s. (0.09 seconds)