Time for a Bloodbath
Anyone who loves movies will have heard of Sam Raimi's "The Evil Dead" even if they haven't watched it as this is one of those horror movies deemed too gruesome in some countries. The amazing thing about that is not that "The Evil Dead" was made on a tiny budget unlike some horror movies these days but for a movie which is over 30 years old it still has pretty much the same effect watched now as it did back in the 80s. Yes you can see it was filmed on a budget and the acting certainly isn't great but it does a lot of the great things with little money and makes you cringe thanks to the level of violence and bucket loads of fake blood.
Five friends; Ash (Bruce Campbell), his girlfriend Linda (Betsy Baker), his sister Shelly (Sarah York), Scotty (Hal Delrich) and Cheryl (Ellen Sandweiss) head up to an abandoned cabin in the woods for a short vacation. Whilst there they discover a book in the cellar called the Necronomicon, "The Books of the Dead" as well as a tape recorder. When they play the tape they learn all about the book made from human skin with incantations scribed in human blood inside but when they listen to the incantations on the tape it unleashes some form of evil in the woods which one by one possesses the friends with the only way to survive is to decapitate the possessed.
So from that synopsis "The Evil Dead" sounds nothing but just another cabin in the woods movie although this time the five friends are not horny teens but twenty some things. And in fairness that is what the movie is, a cabin in the woods movie where are friends face a mysterious evil and have to battle to survive. As such it would be fair to say that it could be easy to be a little unimpressed during the set up as whilst we have some nice horror touches such as seat banging against the cabin and a first person perspective of something evil moving through the woods it just looks like any old horror movie about friends going to a cabin the woods.
But if you have ever started watching "The Evil Dead" and gave up thinking it was boring I suggest going back and keep on watching as to put it simply it turns into a bloodbath. In fact before the blood starts getting splattered everywhere and those who get possessed end up chopped to pieces with an axe we get what for me is one of the movies most unsettling scenes. I won't go into graphic detail but there is a scene where a character gets raped by a tree. The thing is that with the exception of the tree rape scene the level of violence and gore is so over the top that in a strange way it becomes comical. Although at the same time if watching blood splatter, white goo ooze from a mouth and pretty much anything disgusting you can imagine isn't your sort of thing I suggest staying well clear.
What this all boils down to is that "The Evil Dead" is know as a cult classic and deserves that honour. It certainly isn't for everyone which its outrageous level of gore but if you enjoy bloodbaths this will certainly entertain and maybe even repulse a little.
