EVIL DEAD 2013: Daring you to see it

Well, it's all abuzz on the internet now; here is the RED BAND trailer for the new Evil Dead remake. Keep in mind, this gets pretty grisly!



My thoughts? I love it.

I'm a massive whore for the original films (well, the first two), and think Drag Me To Hell is a spiritual sequel to Sam Raimi's cult classics. Skepticism for the remake is definitely abated by the fact that Raimi, other original producer Rob Tapert and original star Bruce Campbell are on board and being guiding lights in the production. I don't think the film can ever feel like a true part of the Evil Dead mythos, but that is more down to just how much time has passed and how far cinema has gone. Seeing a bloody vomit, head in bag, Book of the Dead wrapped in barbed wire, a woman being kicked into a cellar, and the return of the rapey trees (man, I sound so misogynistic!) makes me think this film won't pull punches and will hopefully be as much of a hoot as the original film. I doubt it will be quite as quirky as Evil Dead 2, though there does seem to be some deeply dark humour to be found in the trailer, so maybe the film will be peppered with that.

One of the most annoying trends recently has been trailers giving too much away (see Sinister for a prime example), and I fear that this trailer is so good that that may be what is the case here, but then again, most of the demonic action seems to focus on just one woman, and as we all know from the original, each member of the group is tortured one by one, so here's to hoping.

Evil Dead coming in the next couple of months? Yes, please!

30 Day Horror Challenge-Day 22: A frightening child actor

For the next 30 days (or whenever I stop being lazy and finish it), I will be giving my fingers short bursts of exercise by completing the 30 Day Horror Challenge, found here. Hopefully it will give you a bit of insight into what horror is for me. Don't forget to check back every day for a new installment.

Day 22: A frightening child actor

This is a pretty tough one. The obvious choice is the kid from Pet Sematary and Wes Craven's New Nightmare, but I thought I'd try a less obvious choice (as has been my wont to do for the entire '30' day challenge), so I am going to go with Daeg Faerch, the young Michael Myers in Rob Zombie's Halloween remake. In a role that was always going to be questioned by Halloween fans, Faerch holds his own and brings an intensity that ranges between sympathetic to all out rage. We are given a look at his troubled childhood, showing us where the darkness began, and we are on his side all the way, from abuse father, to schoolyard bullies. It makes it all that more conflicting when we see him begin his viciousness (which I will refrain from going in to, for those who might still check out the flick). When the boy is institutionalised, we see the poor kid drift further and further away from us and from reality, as he grasps to understand what he has done. Even though we have flat out seen him be a cold-blooded murderer and know he is mentally deranged, we still feel for him as we see him etch closer and closer to the Michael Myers we all know. Through an exploitation by his doctors, and the loss of his mother, the only one who was there for him, we see him become nothing more than The Shape.

30 Day Horror Challenge-Day 20: A great remake

For the next 30 days (or whenever I stop being lazy and finish it), I will be giving my fingers short bursts of exercise by completing the 30 Day Horror Challenge, found here. Hopefully it will give you a bit of insight into what horror is for me. Don't forget to check back every day for a new installment.

Day 20: A great remake

The Amityville Horror. No doubt. There have been some remakes I have really enjoyed, but most have been so different from the original that they avoid comparison (the Dawn of the Dead remake being the prime example), whereas Amityville is very similar to it's 1979 counterpart in terms of general story and plot points, except it improves and adds to every single aspect. There is nothing about the remake that isn't superior to the original. It was just the other day when I was explaining a problem I had with the original Amityville Horror, which I feel exploits a real life tragedy, so feel I am in a bit of a moral dilemma with the remake, as it treads the same ground. The way I feel a bit more ok with it? The film is cinematic, definitely a film. There is no doubt this thing is a Hollywood product. There is a star in it (in Ryan Reynolds, who is awkward in the father role, but to the characters benefit). Michael Bay produced. The Indian burial ground subplot is brought to the forefront. In essence, this film is more inspired by what are said to be true events, as opposed to based on, which is quite a difference. Plus the Hollywood shine puts a major distance between the viewer, the screen, and reality. 

So, moral quandaries aside, this is a remake that surpasses the original in every respect, taking what I consider a piss poor, lagging and cheap haunted house film and injects it with the Michael Bay steroids it needed to be engaging, scary, and a decent flick. 

30 Day Horror Challenge-Day 19: A horror movie that gives you nightmares

For the next 30 days (or whenever I stop being lazy and finish it), I will be giving my fingers short bursts of exercise by completing the 30 Day Horror Challenge, found here. Hopefully it will give you a bit of insight into what horror is for me. Don't forget to check back every day for a new installment.

Day 19: A horror movie that gives you nightmares

I'm sure that with this horror challenge people are losing respect for me by the post, so let me through any last cred I had out the window and answer today's challenge with the 2004 remake of The Grudge. Let's be uber clear here, I AM talking about an American remake of a decent Japanese flick, with Sarah Michelle Gellar in it. I stand here, unashamed (ok, slightly ashamed). There is a bit of a disclaimer here though. I have never watched a horror that has completely freaked me out to the point of giving me nightmares, or having leave the lights on. Never. But The Grudge was one of the first truly scary horrors I saw in the cinema. I had seen plenty of others before this, including the other somewhat slicker remake, The Ring, and though it had jumps in it, it was an easy bared experience. But The Grudge? Hell no. I have a brilliant audience to thank for one of the greatest cinema experiences I have had, as people were uneasy within minutes of the film, and quick off the mark to scream. 

Sure, everyone laughed at how silly we all were jumping at this silly little film, but we were still all in the zone for it, still jumping, still wringing every moment of tenseness we could from the film. I didn't have bad dreams after it at all, or even feel uneasy walking home in the pitch black dark, but one odd side effect of this group hysteria was I found myself on edge with some other films I watched, even if I had seen them before. Case in point, Resident Evil, a film I bemoaned as a bad adaptation of the great video game and just generally a bad zombie film in general. I had seen it before, with no worries, but I vividly remember lying on my couch, knowing exactly where the film was going to end up and- GAAAHHH! Where did those crows come from!? What the heck!? Why did that freak me out this time and not before? 

It wasn't a great film, but The Grudge was scary, at least with the crowd I saw it with, and it left a lasting effect at that informative time in my horror education.

30 Day Horror Challenge-Day 2: A disappointing or unnecessary remake

For the next 30 days, I will be giving my fingers short bursts of exercise by completing the 30 Day Horror Challenge, found here. Hopefully it will give you a bit of insight into what horror is for me. Don't forget to check back every day for a new instalment.

Day 02: A disappointing or unnecessary remake.

So many possibilities, only one I can spit all my vitriol at; A Nightmare on Elm Street. I was worried from the get go when I heard about the remake, probably more worried people would actually like it and it would replace Wes Craven's original in the public psyche. Then I saw the film… There was absolutely nothing about the film that justified its existence. Every character was completely 2D (even by horror film standards), the CG effects were lame, the story was pointless, and it made Freddy Vs Jason look amazing in comparison. The film actually teased with having there being an unexpected turn in Freddy’s backstory as a child molester, bringing something insightful and new to the character, but in the end, backed out and ended up where even the most casual Freddy fan expected. Jackie Earle Haley was the only thing close to decent about the film, bringing a real darkness to a role that had notoriously camped up, but there was too little to work with, plus his makeup made him look like a deformed hamster. Not exactly the thing of nightmares!

30 Day Horror Challenge-Day 1: A horror movie that delivered a scary theatrical experience

For the next 30 days, I will be giving my fingers short bursts of exercise by completing the 30 Day Horror Challenge, found here. Hopefully it will give you a bit of insight into what horror is for me. Don't forget to check back every day for a new instalment.

Day 01: A horror movie that delivered a scary theatrical experience.

I could go on again about the fun that was hearing grown men scream at ParanormalActivity 3, but seen as I already gushed about that, I’ll go a different direction and choose the first horror film I saw in the cinema that delivered a fantastically hair-raising experience; The Grudge. Yup, The Grudge. And not the brilliant Japanese Ju-On, but the Sarah Michelle Gellar, dumbed-down US version. People slate it all the time, but The Grudge was the first time I ever experienced an entire cinema audience scream, jump and laugh in relief in unison. I’ll stand by the film (though not its lesser sequels), probably because never before had I seen the profound effect horror could have on a crowd. There were dozens of very different people in that theatre, but when the strep-throated ghoul girl attacked, everyone was completely on the same page. Ridiculously terrifying. Ridiculously fun.