In our Evil Dead (2013) Review we talk about how it is a great example of a horror remake done right. The bones of the original are still there, but Fede Alvarez creates something unique with this new film. While the original The Evil Dead is essentially a student film with a subversive streak, the 2013 Evil Dead is a high budget mainstream Hollywood horror movie with the gore turned up to 11.

Evil Dead 2013 Synopsis

The film is about a group of five friends that unwittingly summon ancient demons to a remote cabin in the woods that possess them one by one. Mia, a heroin addict played by Jane Levy, is the reason for the five of them being at her parents’ cabin in the woods. With the help of her brother David ( Shiloh Fernandez), his hotty girlfriend Natalie (Elizabeth Blackmore), the brainy Eric (Lou Taylor Pucci), and Nurse Olivia (Jessica Lucas), Mia is attempting to quit drugs cold turkey. This comes after a series of failed attempts and a particularly bad overdose where she actually died and had to be revived.

What none of them realized is that while the cabin was abandoned by David and Mia’s parents, it was broken into and used for a demonic exorcism. Left behind was an ancient Book of the Dead that has been wrapped in a garbage bag and barbed wire. Despite the safeguards and very obvious warnings written in blood, Eric, opens the book and proceeds to read an incantation that releases a powerful force of evil.

This evil first attacks and possesses Mia in the woods, and then one by one infects the other cabin dwellers, until only one remains...

https://youtu.be/lWG_w5w8ZLs

Evil Dead Remake Review

Evil Dead is a remake of Sam Raimi’s 1981 The Evil Dead. It keeps some of the building blocks from the original, like the Necronomicon, the cabin in the woods, and the five friends,  but this is definitely its own movie. The tone is dramatically different. While The Evil Dead is essentially a student film with a subversive streak, the 2013 Evil Dead is a high budget mainstream Hollywood horror movie with torture porn influences.

This movie, to me is an example of a remake done right. This isn’t just an attempt to rehash a script with a higher budget. This remake really does create something different from the same ingredients of the original. The story and visual elements that are taken from the original are respectfully handled and well integrated into the new version. I found the storyline of Mia attempting to quit heroin to add another dimension to the plot. It helps to define the characters through their relationship to Mia, and give the whole party a motive for being there.

https://www.horrormovietalk.com/2019/01/23/mandy-review/

The violence and blood is turned up to 11 in this movie and veers more towards the torture porn of the early 2000s. While there were some moments that were very disturbing, I thought it was artfully done and didn’t ever cross the line into tasteless or exploitative.

Overall, I really liked this movie, and I think it stands alone as a great horror movie

Evil Dead (2013) Score

8/10

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Evil Dead (2013) Spoilers and Discussion

Expand for Spoilers

The film opens strong with what we assume is a "final girl" being chased through the woods by hillbillies. They capture her and take her to a basement full of hanging dead cats.

Countless felines take their own lives each year...

We find out that among her captors is her father that reveals that she has killed her own mother. An old woman reads out of a ancient tome that the only way to save the young girls' soul is to burn her alive right there. So they do.

It's dark early in this film.

We are then introduced to the main characters, which are as follows:

David (Dudebro)

Eric (Nerd)

Natalie (Hottie)

Olivia (Nurse)

Mia (Junkie/David's sister)