de facto film reviews 3.5 stars

The dream duo of Sam Raimi and Bruce Campbell are back with another entry in the popular horror franchise, The Evil Dead. Now overseeing Irish director Lee Cronin, Evil Dead Rise moves the relentless Kandarian forces from the iconic cabin in the woods to a murky highrise apartment, à la Demons 2. And while the film also separates itself from the 2013 re-imagining by introducing an all-new cast, there is plenty here to excite fans of the original series and the much darker modern adaptation while delivering what is arguably the Evil Dead’s most horrifying cinematic experience yet.

The film follows Beth (Lily Sullivan), a guitar technician and so-called groupie who visits her estranged sister Ellie (Alyssa Sutherland) and her three children, Danny, Bridget, and Kassie. As Ellie struggles to raise her children following their father’s departure, Beth shoulders the possibility of pregnancy and its natural complications. However, when a sudden earthquake unveils a hidden underground bank vault and a copy of the Necronomicon, the night gets much worse; young Danny unwittingly unleashes the demonic entities tied to the book, which quickly consume Ellie and seek to swallow her family’s souls.

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Cronin and company intelligently downscale the effective area of the horror to one primary floor of the apartment building, which Ellie reveals is due to be demolished very soon, leaving only a handful of tenants. This decision tightens up the relevant cast, featuring only a few tertiary characters, a.k.a demon food, and isolates them to a smaller space, ultimately building more suspense. Although the minimalistic use of this massive location leaves potential content on the table, Evil Dead Rise executes its concept so well that it hardly matters. Once Deadite Ellie arrives back on the scene, trapping the characters to this floor from Hell, the horror spectacle overshadows such logistical holes.

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Evil Dead Rise quickly gears up for an unstoppable descent into the terrors and hardships of motherhood amplified by the quirky, bloody, chaotic extremity of the hit franchise that fans know and love. The Deadites are notoriously witty, as usual, and brutal in their various mutilations. The gore is comparable to the 2013 feature, incredibly in-your-face, gross, and practical, but arguably even more creative. But Rise shines its willingness to throw a handful of children into the mix, intensifying an already alarming situation and daring to shatter taboos. The audio design, supervised by Peter Albrechtsen, is also one of Rise’s defining characteristics, effectively sustaining the bloody vomit-fueled insanity.

Despite its strengths, few horror movies are flawless, and Evil Dead Rise is no exception. Some of the dialogue is unnatural, and besides Beth, the characters fail to grow beyond their predetermined archetypes. When the source of the evil trespasses upon the residents’ seemingly safe world, their arcs suddenly cease to matter. That said, those otherwise pivotal story elements rarely make a difference in the Evil Dead film franchise (Ash being the sole exception), so for a one-off entry like Rise, the horror should – and does – take precedence. In the twisted face of Sutherland’s disturbing performance alone, eliciting one of the franchise’s best Deadites, Rise is likely the scariest Evil Dead yet. The unending tension creates an experience that is impossible to look away from without over-relying on jump scares and CGI, and there are plenty of fun callbacks to its predecessors for fans to cheer for. Therefore, Cronin successfully creates a frightening, satisfying, and undeniably groovy Evil Dead film, proving that change can sometimes be a good thing after all.

EVIL DEAD RISE is now showing in theaters.