Evil Dead Rise (2023) Dir. Lee Cronin

The biggest problem with returning to the Evil Dead franchise is that there has not been anyone who could truly replace Bruce Campbell. As a leading man, he took influence from the slapstick greats to bring levity to the body horror and gallons of fake blood.

This injection of humour worked because audiences were never allowed to become desensitised to the horrors on screen; Campbell, along with writer and director Sam Raimi, always made sure that something would make the viewer laugh – be it a witty one-liner or a sequence of physical comedy – so that they would be caught off-guard by the next scare.

When Fede Alvarez rebooted (remade?) Evil Dead in 2013, he remembered the cabin in the woods, the Steadicam hunting down Deadite victims through the trees and the gallons of fake blood but missed out the humour. It was by no means a bad film but was a far cry from the original and indistinguishable from the horde of extreme body horrors.

Fans have been able to get their fix from the Ash vs Evil Dead show, and the Evil Dead video game, but it has been ten long years since the pages of the Necronomicon were opened on the big screen. Luckily, Lee Cronin, who previously helmed the decent, if unspectacular, The Hole in the Ground, finds that balance between humour and scares, between call-backs and original ideas.

From the cold open, Cronin deftly updates some of the established series tropes. The dark spirits rushing through the woods is revealed to be a drone; the cabin in the woods is not some ramshackle hut but a beautiful holiday home, where a Deadite-possessed young woman reels off Wuthering Heights instead of guessing cards.

Then we switch out. Heading to the big city, where guitar technician Beth (Lily Sullivan) makes an impromptu visit to her sister Ellie (Alyssa Sutherland), who lives in a rundown apartment block with her three children Bridget (Gabrielle Echols), Danny (Morgan Davies) and Kassie (Nell Fisher).

It doesn’t take long for the Deadites to make their chaotic presence felt. Cronin does just enough character development to inform some nice story beats later in the film, but with a tight 90-minute runtime, time is of the essence. Ellie is the first one to be taken, and Sutherland’s performance is star making. The use of family, rather than a group of young teens, adds an interesting dynamic as the Deadites try to coerce as much as torture and Sutherland beautifully switches between darkly funny threats and creepy persuasions.

Then there’s the blood. So much blood. There’s enough squirm inducing injuries and gore to keep to even the most extreme horror fans satisfied. But Cronin seems to know exactly when to utilise this, ensuring there are enough jokes and quiet moments between the splatter.

The dilapidated apartment building adds a new tension to proceedings as well. Instead of acres of woods to be chased through, the action is primarily confined to a single corridor, ratcheting up the dread as there is nowhere to run.

The second third of the film easily ranks this as the best Evil Dead movie since Sam Raimi’s second entry, but this isn’t perfect. Evil Dead Rise suffers from diminishing returns (not to mention the spoilerific trailer which highlights many of the story beats).

The final chase sequence feels particularly weak, especially after the highs earlier in the film. Sutherland is so good as Ellie, that the addition of more Deadites for the final conflict feels unnecessary.

Still, there’s plenty here to keep horror fans grinning and squirming in equal measure. Between this and Scream, 2023 is looking like a great year for franchises.

★★★★

4/5

Matthew Tilt

Twitter @Matthew_Tilt