Evil Dead II (1987)

Director: Sam Raimi

Cast: Bruce Campbell, Sarah Berry, Dan Hicks, Kassie Wesley

Have I Seen it Before: A couple of us guys watched it late one night in High School. When you’re taking in movies at that age, you’re more susceptible than at any other point in your life* than to have contrary opinions about movies, just for the sake of having contrary opinions about it.

I didn’t like the film. You would have thought that I had pledged my life to Al-Qaida. For years after that, I wondered if I had taken the stance because I too felt that need to not enjoy something everyone was.

I honestly haven’t watched the film since.

Did I Like It: Well…

I really wanted to. As you—or at least, as I—head north of forty, there’s a temptation to like something more than its reputation or your own memory would suggest. Star Wars - Episode I: The Phantom Menace (1999) becomes a unique symbol of the auteur, and a children’s film making the bold choice to be mostly about trade policy. Batman & Robin (1997) is a heartfelt action adventure film, if you can get over most of the writing and cheap staging. I’ll defend The Shadow (1994) despite an array of flaws weighing it down.

It’s time for me to give Evil Dead II another chance.

And yet.

Something about this film just doesn’t connect with me. It’s nothing more than a cheap array of horror gags. Perhaps more polished than the original The Evil Dead (1981), but never concerned with being as satisfying as Army of Darkness (1992). All of the pieces of Raimi’s brilliance are here, but they don’t cook together. The gore sprays. The monsters groan. Campbell mugs. Rinse and repeat. Campbell is a charming enough presence, but there’s a reason that he was never a big enough star to be the lead in Darkman (1990) or the villain in an eventual sequel to Spider-Man (2002). I think he might agree, and indeed has made a career based on this very same image, but Campbell isn’t much more than a B actor.

*Some people never get over it.

Darkman (1990)

Director: Sam Raimi

Cast: Liam Neeson, Frances McDormand, Colin Friels, Larry Drake

Have I Seen it Before: Oh, sure.

Did I Like It: On spec, the notion of Liam Neeson leading a Raimi-infused action steeped in the aesthetic of the classic Universal horror films would be at the top of my list of films to watch this year.

Releasing the movie in 1990 before Raimi had his solid run in the 1990s leading up to the breakthrough hit of Spider-Man (2002) and before Neeson had even been in Husbands and Wives (1992) to say nothing of Schindler’s List (1993)… It seems like a crazy idea, but I’m so glad it is there.

For me, this one gives Spider-Man 2 (2004) a run for its money as Raimi’s best work. Every manic impulse is on full display, and none of it has the self-conscious quality of some of his later work. Neeson, on the same front, is becoming the gruff, irate action hero we now know him to be, decades before anyone realized he had a particular set of skills.

Many of the great filmmakers have those films that never got made and we’re left wondering what could have been. Spielberg always wanted to make a Bond picture. Welles (and, for that matter, George Lucas) had his eyes set on some kind of adaptation of Heart of Darkness. James Cameron’s treatment of Spider-Man has always been the stuff of legend, snuffed out by protracted rights issues. Raimi has been on the record wanting at various points to do an adaptation of The Shadow. He didn’t get the go ahead in the 90s, and by the 2000s, he had indicated that he was never able to crack the story the way he wanted. By now, it may be too late. But at least we have this film. It may make us long for that lost film even more, but we are given a taste of what could have been.

The Evil Dead (1981)

Director: Sam Raimi

Cast: Bruce Campbell, Ellen Sandweiss, Richard DaManicor, Betsy Baker

Have I Seen it Before: No. I’m usually tempted to say at points like this “strangely, no” but I’m more tempted in this particular case to question whether most people have seen it.

Did I Like It: I’m going to try real hard not to blur the lines between my review for this and my eventual review for Evil Dead II (1987), even though Raimi and company didn’t feel much of a need to differentiate between the two films while making them. My memory of the sequel was that I didn’t see the big deal that everyone was going nuts over, and the same can be said here.

I’m all for horror. I’m all for Raimi’s other work*. There’s just something about the Deadites that always left me cold to varying degrees, and seeing them in their prototypical form doesn’t do much to dissuade that. You’ve got to wait for Army of Darkness (1992) or even Evil Dead Rise (2023) before my heart grows big enough to embrace the carnage.

The film isn’t entirely without charms. Seeing a horror movie made with the same kind of near-zero budget and in the same era as Halloween (1978) but that embraces the supernatural aspects of horror, even if the budget isn’t always there to back it up. It’s also worth glancing—if for only the jarring quality that may be my most lasting memory of the film—at a version of Bruce Campbell so youthful that it’s difficult to imagine the Bruce Campbell residing somewhere in his future.

*Drifting through some of the information on this film, I can’t help but be consumed by a desires—as we all must, from time to time—to watch Darkman (1990).

Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (2022)

Director: Sam Raimi

Cast: Benedict Cumberbatch, Elizabeth Olsen, Rachel McAdams, Xochitl Gomez

Have I Seen it Before: Feels almost normal to be catching a film on opening weekend.

Did I Like It: The first Doctor Strange (2016) had enough, er, strangeness going for it that it elevated a character for which I had absolutely no feeling previously and made him one of my favorite Marvel characters (I’m still marching my way through the Masterworks volumes). When the title for this, his second solo-film* was announced, I thought it just might be one of the wildest titles ever dreamt up by anyone. When the imminently competent Scott Derrickson stepped aside from directing duties on the sequel, owing to the ubiquitous destructor that is “creative differences**”, only to be replaced by Sam Raimi, it seemed like this one was well on its way to being one of the all time greats in all the MCU.

And… it’s fine. It is (in frustrating fits and starts) more interested in table setting than being as weird as it could be. We get how the X-Men and the Fantastic Four might join the MCU after Disney’s acquisition of 20th Century Fox, but that act isn’t really committed to. It’s not like we’re getting a post-credits scene of Avengers Tower being converted into the Baxter Building. As far as table-setting films in the MCU go, it probably fairs better than Iron Man 2 (2010) or Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015), but the film is doomed to be less than the sum of its parts.

It rises above those other films, likely due to Raimi’s sure hand and singular style. There’s a reasonable argument to be made that this can probably double as the least satisfying Evil Dead film as well, so even Raimi isn’t really showing up to play, although I don’t get the feeling throughout that the man really wanted to get fired. I’m looking in your direction, Spider-Man 3 (2007).

*Has there been a character who has guest-starred in more Marvel movies? To my memory, I can’t come up with one.

** How many “could have beens” are there in the MCU? I’d attempt to list them, but after dwelling on just how great Edgar Wright’s Ant-Man (2015) might have been, I’d probably just get depressed and stop right there.

Drag Me to Hell (2009)

Director: Sam Raimi

Cast: Alison Lohman, Justin Long, Lorna Raver, Dileep Rao

Have I Seen it Before: Never. Odd side note, this has been another one of those DVDs that have been sitting on my shelf for years, and no kidding, until a few days ago it had still been shrink-wrapped with Hastings wrapping. Remember Hastings? Well there hasn’t been one around in over four years, and I’m almost positive I purchased this particular volume while I still lived relatively close to such a store, and that’s been eight years. I’m even willing to venture a guess that I bought it closer to 2010. So, I’ve just had this DVD sitting on various shelves through no less than four homes.

The things we can all find time for this year... At least the disc worked. There’d be no way to return it anymore.

Did I Like It: So, for reasons that would take the interested only a few moments to find, I’ve had a bit of a complicated relationship with horror these last few years. For a while there, the mere act of watching a horror movie had become a mind-numbing chore. Said chore had gone on for so long that I was beginning to get a very jaded view of the genre. I’ll still have undying affection for Halloween (1978) and even recent fare like Us (2019). So many people have desperately wanted to elevate horror to something high-minded and lofty, when at it’s best, it is nothing more or less than a carnival attraction. It works best when analyzed least, and instead felt viscerally.

But I’m pleased to report that this film is a brilliant roller coaster. Raimi—having shaken off the obvious burden his Spider-Man films had become—is working at the top of his game. He’s not afraid of camp. He’s not afraid of camp when its needed. He’s not afraid of a good jump scare here and there. He’s not afraid to let us enjoy ourselves.

And it works. For 99 minutes I forgot I had become a horror grump. That’s more than enough to recommend.