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60Despite much old-school splatter, it’s seldom frightening and oddly unfunny.
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60It is nowhere near as creepy as the recent indie horror "V/H/S," but it is a full-bloodedly grisly and macabre film that zaps over a few scares.
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Apr 15, 201360Closer to Eli Roth than Sam Raimi, this brutal retread combines J-horror atmospherics with torture-porn kills. It’s more evisceration than invention but at least has the courage of its bloody-minded convictions.
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Apr 15, 201360Prepare yourself for a shock: a horror remake that, at its best, manages to recapture the original’s hardcore nastiness. It could certainly do with laughing at itself a bit more, though.
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70Though it never channels the raw DIY energy of the original Evil Dead series — what big-budget version could? — this polished, clever remake remains true to the spirit of the original, which was at once viscerally terrifying and weirdly lighthearted.
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50The passing of the torch from Raimi to Alvarez is not a momentous occasion. In the end, who really cares? Five years from now, will you want to watch this bloody $14 million extravaganza or Raimi’s shoestring original, which was Amateur Hour elevated to pop art?
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50Are we really looking to Evil Dead for gnarly possessions played straight? That’s what Alvarez gives us for an overlong stretch, until his reinterpretation of the malevolent-hand gag kicks off a last act that’s more freewheelingly, twistedly grisly. (Don’t skip the credits, because the fan-energizing momentum peaks at the very end.)
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40Because while it can boast of some truly extraordinary special effects -- stomach-churning, face-hacking, arm-slicing visual effects, the kind that are sure to titillate the gleefully twisted -- this Evil Dead is far more gruesome than awesome.
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50Evil Dead is just a well-made gross-out, and it's kind of a bummer.
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63So long as you grit your teeth and keep your eyes on the screen, it’s an enjoyable, if almost academic, exercise in bad taste.
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50More stomach-churning than soul-chilling. The list of on-screen atrocities includes attacks by nail gun, electric carving knife, chain saw, shotgun, crowbar and chunk of ceramic from a broken toilet tank, used as a crude bludgeon.
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25This remake of the 1981 horror classic starts well, but it soon degenerates into tiresome shock gore that overstays its welcome, despite the film's modest run time. Jane Levy as a heroin addict going through withdrawal is the one bright spot.
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67I learned a total of two things from watching Evil Dead: No camping kit is complete without duct tape, and sometimes end credits are worth sitting through for a movie's best gag.
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70It's unlikely the movie will gain the same ardent following as Raimi's debut, but it offers enough good-time gore, goofiness, scares and screams to leave an audience feeling a certain elated exhaustion.
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60Doesn’t have the original’s wooden performances, puffy clothes and hairdos or its amusingly crude special effects, but it does share its blood lust.
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88It’s ultimately everything a modern horror movie should be.
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50Goes overboard on the gruesome and scrimps on humor. Raimi's "Drag Me to Hell" was a much funnierchill-fest.
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50This isn't just a horror movie with gore - it's a gore movie, period. Blood is its raison d'etre. It's not scary. It's not shocking. It just wallows in viscera. Ho-hum. Pass the ketchup.
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75Alvarez triumphs because he made one crucial decision: Avoid digital animation and use only practical in-camera special effects. He uses every trick from classic Hollywood and invents a few of his own.
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70Effective scares, respectful nods to its inspiration and a few new twists make the question of whether this new Evil Dead succeeds in matching its inspiration superfluous. This is one remake that succeeds on its own blood-soaked terms.
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Apr 4, 201375Be warned that this is a movie literally awash in blood and graphic violence.
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60There is nothing about Evil Dead as groundbreaking as Raimi’s films (particularly the first two). But it’s smarter and better done than a lot of what’s come since those movies were made, which is to say there is at least some thought behind the killings.
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25Though it tries — with a much too heavy hand — the new Evil Dead is far less humorous than its predecessor.
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60Though Alvarez keeps us watching, he takes no real chances. Buried under all those enthusiastically mangled bodies is the comfort of familiarity. He may have intended to remake a single film, but we’ve seen this movie countless times before.
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50Evil Dead offers the core audience for modern horror plenty of reasons to jump, and then settle back, tensely, while awaiting the next idiotic trip down to the cellar beneath the demon-infested cabin in the woods.
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Apr 4, 201375The setup and geography are consistent with the original, though the film never makes the mistake of trying to rebottle the lightning that electrified Sam Raimi's movie.
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25This isn't a strict remake of Sam Raimi's hugely influential 1981 horror classic, but it does include the basic framework and some visual nods to the original. On its own, it's an irredeemable, sadistic torture chamber reveling in the bloody, cringe-inducing deaths of some of the stupidest people ever to spend a rainy night in a remote cabin in the woods.
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67Evil Dead, however, accomplishes what it sets out to do: Scare viewers silly and uphold a tradition.
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83While Raimi’s Stooges aesthetic — which was really more prominently displayed in the sequels than in 1981’s The Evil Dead — isn’t played up here, there’s enough outrageous unreality to make the brutality go down a little easier. It isn’t quite a cartoon, but it’s close enough.
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Apr 3, 201383The new Evil Dead's delirious gross-out scenes spoke to me, and they go further than any mainstream picture I can think of.