The Evil Dead (1981) | Canadian First Time Watching | Movie Reaction | Movie Review | Commentary

These movies are gems, George is REALLY gonna love army of darkness. It is so.... Groovy!

I hope you guys do the sequel, which is my personal favorite of the original trilogy. Which if you do, you should know that, for some reason there were rights issues so the sequel opens with a recap of the first movie with completely different actors. A lot of people thought Ash was stupid enough to take a whole bunch of new friends up to the cabin but according to Bruce Campbell himself it was a rights issue thing. I hope that's not considered a spoiler, just wanted to give you guys a heads up so it's not confusing if you do the second film.

The entire trilogy and the entire 3 seasons of Ash Vs. The Evil Dead are truly fantastic and must be watched. As for the movies without Bruce Campbell, i don’t know because I’m a chicken who gets too scared unless Ash is there to crack a joke and save the day.

Fun fact: The cabin where they filmed didn't actually have a basement; the trapdoor that suddenly swings open only led to a crawlspace. The basement portion was filmed in Sam Raimi's garage, if I remember correctly. And yes, Sam purposely hung a torn poster for The Hills Have Eyes, as a nod to another very famous and influential director, Wes Craven... Wes Craven would return the favor three years later by having Nancy watch The Evil Dead on TV in A Nightmare on Elm Street.

I swear, if there was an award for thumbnails... I really appreciate your creativity 😊

So many reactors skip the first one and I'm glad you watched it because I knew you could appreciate the ingenuity and the energy! Sam Raimi is one of my favorite directors simply because of how goofy and unhinged he can be and how he doesn't let low budgets and "obviously fake" special effects hinder himself. If anything, it often feels as if he really likes special effects that are obviously fake. (I haven't seen his Dr. Strange, though.) The Coen brothers and the Raimi brothers (Sam and Ted) are friends and this was not the last time they worked together in some way. The Coens' brilliant debut feature Blood Simple came out in -84. I hear the filmmakers later thought that the SA by a tree was taking it too far.

Not only is this an incredibly effective horror flick, it's one of the most influential movies of all time. It didn't just launch a whole franchise (and an untold number of ripoffs/imitators), it launched the careers of Sam Raimi (the Spider-Man trilogy), the Coen Brothers (The Big Lebowski, No Country For Old Men), and Rob Tapert (Hercules and Xena). And it all started with a bunch of inexperienced film school kids going to a cabin in Tennessee and making things up as they went along.

Yeah, you should definitely do the sequels. The nice thing about every Evil Dead movie is that it feels different in each way. The first one is a dark, brutal, and gruesome movie. Evil Dead 2 is a mixture of horror and humor. Army of Darkness is a fun mixture of horror, comedy, action, and fantasy movies. The entire Evil Dead Trilogy is one of the best movie trilogies out there.

I’m pretty sure this is the movie that invented the “cabin in the Woods “trope in horror, movies

The sequels are absolutely worth watching, you guys will love them. Reacting to the recent TV show would be excellent as well.

Also 2013 is not a remake, Campbell and Raimi both confirmed it's a different cabin in the same universe.

The sequel is where I jumped into the franchise. Because that was so amazing I went back to watch this film. Yes, the sequel is still my favorite, but this one makes a huge impression as well. You could tell everyone involved was trying to stretch what little they had into making a really gory and scary story.

This first movie was little more than a student film. The sequel is pretty much more of a remake of the first, but the second time around they purposefully (and correctly) leaned into the campiness and dark humor. And the third (just titled Army of Darkness) is just purest gourmet cheese of the best kind and can barely be called a horror at that point. The third is my personal favorite.

FINALLY! I've been waiting ages for you to finally be confronted with this madness. Please do every movie in the series. They're all worth it.

Classic film! Guillermo Del Toro and Tarantino (along with many other great modern filmmakers) constantly reference this movie as a major influence

Fun fact: canonically this tree in the beginning is called “angry molesting tree”, and it’s also in “the cabin in the woods”

The full sentence that quote was taken from was in a review that King wrote about the film...speaking of Raimi, King wrote: "That he is a genius is yet unproven; that he has made the most ferociously original horror film of 1982 is to me beyond doubt."

In case no one else mentions it, yes this was before the Coen bros even made a film. They have both mentioned they actually learned more working on exploitation movies like this than the arthouse scene. You can see the influence of working with Raimi on their first film, the neo-noir BLOOD SIMPLE (1984), which I highly recommend.

These movies are the pinnacle of excessive blood and gore. They were also known for the great practical effects. They mounted the camera on a board and ran through the woods to get the intro shots. Asks her about her "snake tube." That's just not something most people talk about in public.

The making of this movie is legendary. Just as entertaining as the movie itself