Book of the Dead can’t die, but should
Gory, but shallow, ‘Evil Dead Rise’ shows few signs of life
There’s a whole lot of blood and not much else in “Evil Dead Rise,” the latest chapter in the horror franchise, which could use a little of the spirited, campy, wink-wink charm of the original entries in the series.
Here, we spend most of the runtime locked in an urban apartment building where the Necronomicon, the series’ fated Book of the Dead, has unleashed all manner of unholiness on a mother, her sister and her three children.
World-record levels of red stuff are spilled in the film’s blooddrenched climax, but it’s no substitute for the film’s lack of wit or self-awareness.
Alyssa Sutherland is Ellie, mom of three, who lives in a wholly decrepit (and unconvincing) section of Los Angeles. (New Zealand stands in here for the City of Angels.)
Her sister Beth (Lily Sullivan) comes to visit on a night where an earthquake opens up a hole beneath the building, and Ellie’s teenage DJ son Danny (Morgan Davies) comes across an odd looking book and, whaddya know, its nifty vinyl accompaniments. After remixing some LCD Soundsystem tracks in his bedroom, he tosses on the record and, whoops, awakens the dead. Ellie is first to be infected with the sickness, and all sorts of nastiness unfurls, as Beth — who has recently learned she’s pregnant — and the children are forced to fight for their lives against the mother of all evil.
And that’s that; despite some nods to maternal themes, the rest is a showcase for Irish writer-director Lee Cronin to show his stuff. How grungy and grimy is he willing to get? Very, it turns out, but “Evil Dead Rise” — despite a thrilling opening sequence and an operatic title card — quickly settles into a rut of gore for gore’s sake, screams with nothing behind them and plodding darkness.
There’s blood galore, but invention and ingenuity are in short supply. (Although a sequence set behind a peephole does carry a certain level of gumption.)
Sam Raimi’s original “Evil Dead” trilogy — 1981’s “The Evil Dead,” 1987’s “Evil Dead II” and 1992’s “Army of Darkness” — set a high bar for making a lot with a little, and transformed into glorious, full-blown camp by the crusade-era send up “Army of Darkness.” Ten years ago, the franchise was brought back from the dead by director Fede Álvarez, who traded camp for pulverizing extremity, ramping up the horror and pushing the envelope of intensity. Against those markers, “Evil Dead Rise” can’t measure up, and Cronin overcompensates for his lack of fresh ideas by drowning everything in reservoirs of gore. It’s messy, but it’s thin.
The mostly Australian cast gets good and gooey, especially Sullivan, who probably still has some red residue buried deep in the beds of her fingernails. While the “Evil Dead” series isn’t quite ready to be buried for good, “Evil Dead Rise” shows that not all resurrections are created equal.