|
|
Evil Dead 2: Dead by Dawn (Widescreen/Full Screen)
|
 |
| List Price |
: |
CDN$ 24.95 |
| Our Price |
: |
CDN$ 19.96 |
| You Save |
: |
CDN$ 4.99 (20%) |
| |
|
|
| 4 Used |
: | from CDN$ 6.71 |
| 16 New |
: | from CDN$ 16.45 |
| |
|
|
| Availability |
: |
Usually ships in 24 hours |
|
|
 |
|
|
| Editorial Reviews: | | |  | | Writer-director Sam Raimi's extremely stylized, blood-soaked follow-up to his creepy Evil Dead isn't really a sequel; rather, it's a remake on a better budget. It also isn't really a horror film (though there are plenty of decapitations, zombies, supernatural demons, and gore) as much as it is a hilarious, sophisticated slapstick send-up of the terror genre. Raimi takes every horror convention that exists and exaggerates it with mind-blowing special effects, crossed with mocking Three Stooges humor. The plot alone is a genre cliché right out of any number of horror films. Several teens (including our hero, Ash, played by Bruce Campbell in a manic tour-de-force of physical comedy) visit a broken-down cottage in the woods--miles from civilization--find a copy of the Book of the Dead, and unleash supernatural powers that gut every character in sight. All, that is, except Ash, who takes this very personally and spends much of the of the film getting his head smashed while battling the unseen forces. Raimi uses this bare-bones story as a stage to showcase dazzling special effects and eye-popping visuals, including some of the most spectacular point-of-view Steadicam work ever (done by Peter Deming). Although it went unnoticed in the theaters, the film has since become an influential cult-video favorite, paving the way for over-the-top comic gross-out films like Peter Jackson's Dead Alive. The DVD version presents the film in its original 1:85 to 1 aspect ratio, and includes the theatrical trailer. --Dave McCoy | |
| Custom Reviews: | |
|
| "Evil Dead II" is one of the most hilarious, over-the-top but....., | |
| | ..It's not nearly as good as the original in my opinion. Despite the more professional look and better pacing, I prefer the original for its lack of slapstick. The first worked so well because it was such an unrelenting and grueling experience and was the finest horror film since "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre". It didn't take prisoners, and while its a bit dated it still has the power to terrify the audience. Not to mention it had some great if primitive stop motion effects. I really wish Sam Raimi would make another all out horror film again as that's what he does best.
That being said, "Evil Dead II" is still quite enjoyable on its own merits. I usually hate films that attempt to combine horror with comedy. While "Evil Dead II" is not quite scary, its often hilarious. Imagine an off the wall combination of "Friday the 13th" with the Three Stooges, and you're coming close. The sight gags are often surreal and inspired, the sequence with the hand being the finest. Also, the film is very atmospheric and still maintains a sense of unnerving creepiness, which was completely jettisoned for "Army of Darkness" which I'm a big fan of. This film has plenty of gore to still appeal to fans of the original. The gore is so over-the-top its difficult to find it even remotely offensive.
Special mention must go to Bruce Campbell. While he was a meek and unwilling hero in the first film, he is a completely over-the-top bad a.. in this one! It's a very finely tuned parody performance of action stars. While this is the role that leads him to being typecast, it also made him a cult legend. Its a shame he didn't become a bigger star. While its not as successful as the first installment, "Evil Dead II" is a lot of fun and one of the best combinations of horror and humor.
| | Absolute Comedy/Horror Standard | |
| | Allow me to preface this review with a helpful fact. A few years back when Spin Magazine was writing about the films they felt were the greatest of the 20th century, they chose to include Sam Raimi's sequel to his very first film; which was a small independent horror called The Evil Dead. The Evil Dead was a great film in it's own right, however, the editors at Spin wanted to give Evil Dead 2: Dead by Dawn the recognition they felt it deserved. So they placed it at the top of their list...that's right, they felt that it is, in fact, the single greatest cinematic achievement of the 20th century.
Evil Dead 2 follows Ash Williams and his girlfriend into a small creepy Michigan cottage where they stumble upon some recordings that contain readings from an ancient relic called the book of the dead, and by playing these recordings they unleash demonic supernatural forces that quickly haunt and possess everything from the trees outside and Popeye's lamp to Ash's hand and his girlfriend's severed head. The shenanigans unfold and Ash is more game than perhaps anyone to take on these evil forces as best as he can, but some sort of defeat is consistently inevitable.
As a reader I hope you are not anticipating my rebuttal to Spin Magazine here. I just so happen to concur 100% with Spin's gutsy assertion. On the surface of Evil Dead 2, we are seeing vintage 80s shock horror but it certainly isn't presented deeply enough to qualify amongst the failures within that genre. Evil Dead 2 is microcosmically structured like classic slapstick and macrocosmically it functions as pure satire. In this sense it's budget is used firmly to it's advantage and runs together with the theme of making a select audience laugh, first and foremost. Those who are both distinctly either disturbed by gore or preoccupied by gore as a strength in horror, should take keen note that gore in this film is applied almost exclusively for physical slapstick comedy. Those who hate gore will hate it here and those who love to be immersed in gore may not understand or appreciate it's use in Evil Dead 2.
We get to see a chubby fruit cellar witch's soul-swallowing head extend via shoddy stop-motion effects. We get to see an eyeball pop out of her head and shoot across the room into some chick's mouth. We get so see blood spray humorously and pretty consistently out of the walls and floors of the cottage. We get to see Ash fight his hand, cut it off, and add a chainsaw to where his hand once was. We get to see him kill his girlfriend and fight both her severed head and headless body in a tool shed at the same time. We get to see Ash get clumsily chased around the house by a force of evil we never see. We also get to see the volume of slapstick comedy increase as the film goes on and finally we get to see a conclusion that still makes me kind of wish they never made a sequel (even though Army of Darkness is in and of itself a very good movie).
Evil Dead 2 may require a deeper degree of movie history appreciation, perhaps more specifically to exploitation and horror films. I know I sound like a movie snob saying that but the film does offer some fun and fitting tributes or references to past films. I think it is definitely fair to say that Raimi has a great appreciation for movies in general and we can plainly see that he has so much fun making them. Evil Dead 2 for me is fun, affable, and carefree; it is all the things it shouldn't be on it's surface, and it is perfect for that fact alone.
| | evil dead...good movie..evil dead 2...not so much | |
| | iknow many people thought evil dead 2 was a good movie,but i have to disagree.i could find very little to like about this movie.i found nothing to be scared about, and it wasn't even funny.the acting was not very good and i did not care enough about the characters to be concerned about whether they lived or died.also,the movie starts out as if the original had nver existed,ignoring key sequences and plot points.we are given no explanation for this. the special effects were very bad.i know some people say the movie was made to be delibrately funny,and some people even found it scary.either way it just doesn't work.certainly nowwhere near as effective as the first one reluctant 1* out of five
| | | This sequel to the cult classic film, Evil Dead, is the next installment into, what is praised to be, one of the goriest black comedy horror films to ever hit the film circuit. This film glorifies the very campy fun and essence of your typical B-movie plot, with a side of exaggerated amounts of cartoony violence and blood. Ash takes his girlfriend to a deserted cabin for a splendid weekend together of romance, but everything goes spiralling down into a blaze of horror as Ash idiotically finds a tape recording of a reading of, what is refered to as, "The Book of the Dead." From here on, this is when the film picks up and the girlfriend goes missing after 'something in the woods' smashes through her window. The origin of the book is narrated in the first 2 minutes, and it almost takes and additional 3 minutes for the girlfriend to go missing. For the rest of the film, Ash battles the forces of evil that reincarnate themselves into everything, from huge trees to even small books. The film is hilarious, with its 'splatstick' humor that pays homage to the likes of The Three Stooges. The pop up scares are impeccable and are always right on target with their build ups. This is a fast, fierce, scary, and most of all, incredibly good humored work by Sam Raimi. I highly recommend this film to horror fans who love a good scare, but at the same time, don't mind laughing at the same time as they're doing so.
| | | The first film was devilish and scary , but this is just goofy scary fun.This has so many jumps to make Alfred Hitchcock scared.the special effects are really dated but freakishly creepy and wierd.I do recommend this for a fun scary movie night.
| |
|
|
Home
View Cart
Bookmark This Page
Contact Us
