Moviefone Editorial

Tag: evil-dead

  • 13 Things You Never Knew About ‘The Evil Dead’

    It’s been 35 years since “The Evil Dead” infected theaters and launched the careers of director Sam Raimi and star Bruce Campbell.

    In that time, it’s gained a very impressive (and very deserved) cult following, while also influencing countless horror filmmakers. To celebrate this quirky horror/comedy, here are 13 things you might not know about “The Evil Dead.”
    1. “The Evil Dead” is actually based on a 30-minute short film called “Within the Woods.” Raimi created the Super 8 film as a sort of prototype for prospective investors.

    2. “Within the Woods” wound up inspiring Joel Coen, who worked as an assistant editor on the film. Coen would later take a similar approach when he and his brother, Ethan, were trying to finance their first film, “Blood Simple.”

    3. Several alternate titles were considered, including “Book of the Dead,” “Blood Flood” and “These Bitches Are Witches.”

    4. Given its remote location, Raimi and his cast and crew actually had to live in the cabin for the duration of filming. Those cramped conditions only heightened tensions on set, especially because the cabin lacked any internal plumbing.5. According to local legend, the Tennessee cabin where filming took place was actually the site of a grisly double murder. Raimi and his crew didn’t find out about that story until after they had started filming.

    6. A lot went into creating that infamous melting corpse. Makeup/effects supervisor Tom Sullivan relied on everything from marshmallows to oatmeal to actual, mashed-up cockroaches to achieve the desired effect.7. The film was plagued by production problems and long days and nights of shooting. However, the biggest challenge was simply finding enough money to keep the project going. Raimi had to suspend filming multiple times so he, Campbell, and others could embark on another round of fundraising.

    8. The long stretches of down time are visible in the film, as Campbell’s hairstyle changes multiple times despite the plot unfolding over the course of a single day.9. The 1973 Oldsmobile Delta ’88 that Ash and his friends drive to the cabin has made an appearance in every single Raimi project since, including the current TV series “Ash vs. The Evil Dead” (above).

    10. “The Evil Dead” didn’t make much of a splash when it first debuted in theaters. It was only after horror novelist Stephen King gave the film a rave review that it began attracting more attention and gained a wide release in the UK.11. Decades later, “The Evil Dead” is still banned in some countries because of its graphic content. Even Raimi has admitted he regrets including the scene where Ellen Sandweiss‘ character, Cheryl, is assaulted by a demonic tree.

    12. Between Anchor Bay Entertainment and Elite Entertainment, there were six different versions of “The Evil Dead” released on DVD. One of them even featured a foam latex package designed by Sullivan to look like the Necronomicon.13. There have been a number of unofficial “The Evil Dead” sequels produced by Italian filmmaker Joe D’Amato, including 1988’s “Ghosthouse” and “Witchery.”

  • 12 Things You Never Knew About ‘Army of Darkness’

    2015 marks the 25th anniversary of the cult classic “Army of Darkness.” Is it a horror movie? A campy comedy? Who cares? All we know is that Bruce Campbell‘s Ash Williams is one movie icon who’s stood the test of time.

    So grab your boomstick, hone your one-liners, and check out 12 things you might not know about the final chapter in the original “Evil Dead” trilogy.

    1. Director Sam Raimi originally had a much more pun-worthy title in mind for this sequel. He wanted to call it “The Medieval Dead.”

    2. Officially, the film’s full title is “Bruce Campbell vs. the Army of Darkness.” Raimi wanted to pay homage to classic monster movie mash-ups like “Abbott and Costello Meet the Mummy,” but shortened the title to make the film easier to market.3. Raimi had originally planned to make “Evil Dead 2” set in medieval times, but it was only after the success of 1990’s “Darkman” that Raimi was able to find the budget he needed to bring that story to life.

    4. If that Oldsmobile Delta ’88 looks familiar, it’s probably because it’s appeared in every single Sam Raimi film. For instance, it was also the car Uncle Ben used to drive Peter to the library in 2002’s “Spider-Man.”

    5. Star Trek and Batman fans may also have a case of deja vu watching the film. Portions of “Army of Darkness” were filmed at Vasquez Rocks (the sight of the iconic “Star Trek” episode, “Arena”) and in Griffith Park’s Bronson Canyon (where exterior shots of the Batcave were filmed in the 1966 “Batman” series).
    6. Similarly, Raimi’s brother Ted has a habit of appearing in all his films, and he plays no fewer than three characters in “Army of Darkness” — a soldier, a villager, and an S-Mart employee (above).

    7. Raimi and visual effects supervisor William Mesa used over two dozen storyboards from 1948’s “Joan of Arc” to help craft the film’s final battle sequence.8. Originally, the film was slated to end very differently. More recent DVD collections include the alternate original ending, where Ash drinks too much potion and wakes up in post-apocalyptic London rather than in his own time.

    9. “Army of Darkness” was originally saddled with an NC-17 rating, due in large part to a scene where Ash decapitates a female Deadite. Raimi trimmed that scene, but resisted studio pressure to edit the film down to a PG-13 rating.

    10. “Army of Darkness” saw its release pushed back by several months, as it became collateral damage in a legal battle between Universal Pictures and producer Dino De Laurentiis over the rights to the Hannibal Lecter character.

    11. Because of lingering issues with Universal, the Starz series “Ash vs. Evil Dead” (which is set 30 years after the events of the films) was unable to reference the events of “Army of Darkness’ in its first season. Fortunately, those problems have since been ironed out.12. There have been numerous comic book continuations of “Army of Darkness,” including a series where Ash meets “Re-Animator‘s” Herbert West and another where he battles zombie-fied versions of Marvel heroes.

  • ‘Free Fire’ Director Ben Wheatley on the Film’s Unexpected Inspiration

    If you’ve seen any of British filmmaker Doctor Who” at the start of Peter Capaldi‘s run.)

    His latest film (opening this week) is “Free Fire,” and acts as his take on the 1970s American crime thriller. The film is set in a single location (a ramshackle warehouse in Boston), and features a host of colorful underworld types (played by, amongst others, Armie Hammer, Sharlto Copley, Cillian Murphy, and Brie Larson) as they fight, shoot, and curse at each other. It’s great fun, in the grungiest way possible, starting out as stately and mannered before descending into hellish depravity. Like all other of Wheatley’s films, it’s got a nasty subversive streak, too. This movie doesn’t glamorize shootouts or gunplay; Wheatley makes sure you feel every bullet.

    So it was a real thrill to get to talk to Wheatley about “Free Fire,” its unlikely inspiration, and his next film — a monster mash called “Freakshift” (starring Hammer and Alicia Vikander) that I last spoke to him about way back in 2012.

    The last time I talked to you was back in 2012. You didn’t mention this project but you always have a long list of things you’re going to get to. When did you start thinking about “Free Fire”?

    I think “Free Fire” was written after “Sightseers,” if I remember. But it had been bubbling around for a long time. And there had been another script that was about close-quarter combat stuff that I’d done which was more of a psychedelic thing. And I think the psychedelic stuff ended up being “Field in England” and there are elements of “Free Fire” in “Field of England” as well, to a degree. But it originally came from reading a transcript of a shootout in Miami that the FBI had done. It was realizing that it was possible for highly trained people to have a close-quarter battle for quite some time and miss quite a lot. And that if you read this transcript it’s incredible how messy and chaotic the whole thing is, and how sharply in contrast that is to how Hollywood movies treat this kind of situation. So I thought there’d be a story in there. That was the road to it.You’ve talked about how it was inspired by movies from the ’70s and you even have Martin Scorsese on as an executive producer. Can you talk about what movies you were inspired by and how Scorsese became attached?

    “The Friends of Eddie Coyle” was a big one for me, just the coldness and the stripped structure and the harshness of it. But another film that was influential, which wasn’t a ’70s film, was “Evil Dead 2” (photo above). It became more apparent as we were making it, but that level of swinging the camera around and the slapstick elements of it. We were making it and thinking, This is more [Sam] Raimi than it is the cooler end of ’70s stuff. Because it was much more flying cameras and steadicams and techno-cranes and all of those things that weren’t likely to appear in a ’70s film because they weren’t invented. And Scorsese I met through my agent and I knew that he’d liked “Kill List” because he’d done interviews and mentioned it. I thought, Well, I’ll use that as my in to see if I can get a meeting. Being such a film fan it’s really the pinnacle of fandom to get to chat with Scorsese. So I went and met with him and we spent a couple of hours chatting and it went on from there.

    With this movie, you move away from the slicker elements of action filmmaking but still have to keep things in mind, like geography and spatial relationships. Was it hard to juggle the more technical stuff with what you were trying to do with the characters?

    Yes. There’s a lot of planning that has to go into it. It’s mainly practical effects. There’s hardly any CG in the whole film. And that’s just dangerous and difficult and time-consuming. You make a lot of decisions early on in terms of the setting of the explosives into walls and pillars and all of that stuff. It was all very deliberate in the way that it was made.

    Brie Larson told me there was still a degree of improvisation you allowed with the actors. Was that important for you?

    The thing is, when they’re talking, which is the first third of the film, that stuff is easy to handle. Because they’re all on their feet and there’s no pyrotechnics and stuff. So that could be a lot looser. It’s not improvisation; it’s more paraphrasing than it was just letting people make stuff up. It was more you do a take based on the script and you do a take that you can put back into your own words. “No” is not something I say to actors. I want to see what they’ve got, whatever they’ve got, and if we’ve got the time to shoot it, we’ll do it. Shutting people down and telling them their ideas are no good is not the recipe for happy performances. You want to have an environment where people are ready and willing to risk stuff.Did you have all of these characters’ back-stories worked out, and what all of their relationships were before they end up at the warehouse?

    Yeah, totally. But how relevant that is to the film? Not particularly. It’s interesting. When I listen to the performers tell me the back-story they’ve made up for their characters, I just say, “Yeah, OK, I have no idea what you’re talking about.” But it doesn’t matter. It’s more about interpersonal relationships of characters in the moment. In a lot of ways, it’s about reduction of character not about the expansion of it. It’s the fact that you go from being a person with a future who is thinking about their holiday and has their mortgage to pay and is thinking about the girl they want to go out with in one minute and then in the next minute they’re crawling around on the ground going, “Am I going to live through the next 30 seconds?” That is not a position where you start remembering things that happened in the past or becoming introspective. You are just reduced to surviving. That’s the thing that made me interested in the project. It’s kind of what happens in a way situation or even in the current news cycle, where in one minute there’s a fact that in the next second means something completely different, and no one can remember how we got here.

    One movie we did talk about back in 2012 is “Freakshift.” Are you excited about getting Armie involved and finally shooting?

    Yeah, man. It’s amazing. I’m kind of glad I didn’t make it back then, because I’ve got so much more experience now and I think it would be an overwhelmingly complicated movie to make straight after “Kill List.” But it’s great that it’s finally getting there.

    “Free Fire” opens Friday.

  • Top Rated Movies That Made Directors’ Careers

    Fruitvale StationIt takes everybody time to find their own personal style. Every GQ model did some “experimenting” — whether they had frosted highlights or wore ultra-baggy jeans — before they became fashion icons.

    And so it goes with movie directors. Some movies were growing pains for budding directors, and some were explorations of style. These are the “aha!” explosions that made everyone stand up and take notice.

    The Post-New Wave

    Movies have always had them, but directors weren’t always the figureheads they are now — it wasn’t until the French New Wave of the 1960s that movie geeks started to subscribe to the idea that a movie expressed the personal vision of its director. That theory came courtesy of director François Truffaut, who said, “There are no good and bad movies. Only good and bad directors.”

    By the time the ’70s hit the States, it wasn’t just the ‘zines that paid attention to directors — even the casual moviegoer was in on the game. Low-budget, troubled productions like “Jaws” and “Star Wars” put Steven Spielberg and George Lucas on the map, but it wasn’t until his third swing at a feature that Martin Scorsese found his signature love of New York and Italian crime families in “Mean Streets.”

    For some movie-makers, it wasn’t critical praise that hit home, it was approval from the smaller drive-in crowd. The frenetic camera work of ultra-cheap “The Evil Dead” introduced the world to director Sam Raimi, who went on to helm “Spider-Man,” while the dumpster fire of “Piranha 2” gave fledgling director James Cameron another fiery idea. The image of a robotic skeleton rising from a pit of flames came to him during a stress-induced fever dream — so he took the effects skills and budget management he’d learned and put them into “The Terminator.”

    The ’90s Indie Crew

    Today, you can make a movie on your smartphone, but in the ’90s (when people first starting taking breaks from their cassette collections and Segas to watch indie films), you had to max out your credit cards and develop a taste for ramen to kick-start a directing career. That’s exactly what Kevin Smith did when he sold his comic book collection to make “Clerks,” and what Robert Rodriguez did when he called in every favor under the sun to raise the $7,000 budget of “El Mariachi.” In ’98, Darren Aronofsky helped wrap up the decade with Sundance darling “Pi,” a trippy $60,000 thriller about math that opened the door to studio contracts and a warm seat at the Oscars with movies like “Requiem for a Dream” and “The Wrestler.”

    The New New Wave

    One year, a director puts out a meditative, racially charged indie drama. Two years after that, he’s got enough clout to pull Sylvester Stallone out of Rocky retirement for “Creed.” And after that, Marvel Studios taps him for a surefire mega-hit, “Black Panther.” Such is the story of “Fruitvale Station,” the movie that made Ryan Coogler‘s career.

    And he’s not the only one leading a savvy new charge of camera slingers. Remember the guy who made a feature on his iPhone? Yeah, that’s Orange Is the New Black” scribe Sian Heder just sold the streaming rights to her feature directorial debut, the kidnapping comedy “Tallulah,” to the tune of $5 million. Director, meet career.

    Sources

  • TV Series for the Zombie-Obsessed

    iZombieThere’s no denying that zombies in movies and TV are a full-fledged phenomenon — with AMC’s “The Walking Dead” and its record-breaking ratings leading the charge, fans, like the zombies themselves, are hungry for more. If you’re addicted to “The Walking Dead,” or just want more of the undead in your life, be sure to check out these other shows.

    ‘Ash vs. Evil Dead’ (2015 – )

    The campy “Ash vs. Evil Dead,” picks up after the second movie. Thankfully, the new series maintains the trademark humor and gore of the original two movies, with Bruce Campbell reprising his role as Ash, the character that launched his career, alongside former warrior princess Lucy Lawless. If you’re a fan of the franchise, you’ll feel right at home with “Ash vs. Evil Dead.” If you’re a zombie fanatic new to Ash’s zombie-slaying antics, start with the first two movies before watching the show.

    ‘Talking Dead’ (2011 – )

    “Talking Dead” expands on the fan experience for zombie fanatics: Each episode of “The Walking Dead” is followed by this group discussion, led by Comic-Con panel-moderation veteran Community’s” Yvette Nicole Brown stops by, she comes armed with a notebook full of her thoughts on the show. With “Talking Dead,” AMC has successfully fostered the fan community, keeping the hype going while letting viewers know they aren’t the only ones obsessed with “The Walking Dead.”

    ‘iZombie’ (2015 – )

    There are a million reasons why “iZombie” shouldn’t work as a show, namely its premise — undead zombie hero Liv Moore (get it?) works in a morgue, eating the brains of murder victims, which incidentally provide her with crucial clues about how they were killed. So while the term “zombie procedural” may not be commonplace, that’s exactly what “iZombie” is — a pithy, fun show about a crime-fighting zombie. Like many zombie franchises, “iZombie” makes its own rules about how zombies operate, and the season-long plot arcs involve Liv’s ongoing quest to stop the zombie virus and find a cure for herself. Make no mistake: Between the constant campy nods to the genre (a zombie losing control is referred to as going “full-on Romero”) and the silly references to standard crime procedurals, “iZombie” is hordes of fun.

    ‘Fear the Walking Dead’ (2015 – )

    A spinoff of “The Walking Dead,” “Fear the Walking Dead” is a prequel that takes place on the West Coast in the days before the zombie outbreak. While much of its tension builds on what “The Walking Dead” has shown us will eventually happen (you know, zombies), “Fear the Walking Dead” doesn’t pull any punches when it comes to depicting the decline of civilization — things get grim quickly. The show is easy to settle into, as the cast feels more fresh and the characters less broody than their “Walking Dead” counterparts, injecting a welcome sense of hope into the franchise. But of course, zombies are zombies, so “Fear the Walking Dead” eventually ambles into the familiar territory of a small group of survivors running from one location to the next. There are key location differences — finally, someone realizes that zombies can’t swim, so they take to the sea — but for the most part, “Fear the Walking Dead” doesn’t mess with a formula that works, which is good news for zombie fans.

    ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’ (1997 – 2003)

    Buffy the Vampire Slayer” ventured into all kinds of supernatural territory — including dozens of battles with the undead. Buffy Summers (Sarah Michelle Gellar) was a teenager prophesied to be the Earth’s protector from vampires, zombies, and additional creepy monsters. Along with her mentor Giles (Anthony Head) and a group of friends willing to keep her secret, Buffy protected the world for eight seasons — and a long-running comic book series that raised the canceled TV show from the dead. “Buffy” is a perfect show for zombie fanatics looking to broaden their horizons, and offers interesting insights into the mind of Joss Whedon, who went on to write and direct both “Marvel’s The Avengers” and “Avengers: Age of Ultron.”

    Sources

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  • Here’s the Groovy First Teaser for Starz’s ‘Ash vs Evil Dead’ (VIDEO)

    Ash vs Evil Dead, the evil dead, starz
    Starz has released the first teaser for its upcoming “Evil Dead” sequel series, “Ash vs Evil Dead,” and while it’s short on plot, it’s enough to get fans’ chainsaws revving in excitement.

    The brief clip is really meant to tout the reunion of the franchise’s original masterminds, made up of creator/director Sam Raimi, producer Rob Tapert, and star Bruce Campbell, who are all producing the series. It also features the show’s logo — a callback to the original “Evil Dead” poster — and yes, Campbell’s character’s infamous chainsaw arm.

    The official synopsis, per Starz’s press release:

    Campbell will be reprising his role as Ash, the stock boy, aging lothario and chainsaw-handed monster hunter who has spent the last 30 years avoiding responsibility, maturity and the terrors of the Evil Dead. When a Deadite plague threatens to destroy all of mankind, Ash is finally forced to face his demons –personal and literal. Destiny, it turns out, has no plans to release the unlikely hero from its “Evil” grip.

    “Ash vs Evil Dead” also stars Lucy Lawless, Jill Marie Jones (“Sleepy Hollow”), Ray Santiago (“Touch,” “Meet the Fockers”), and Dana DeLorenzo (“A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas”). The series is set to premiere on Starz sometime later this year.

    [via: Starz]

    Photo credit: Starz

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  • Lucy Lawless Joins Starz Series ‘Ash vs Evil Dead’


    TV veteran Lucy Lawless is bringing her butt-kicking skills to Starz: The actress will play a lead role in upcoming horror-comedy series “Ash vs Evil Dead.”

    The show is a follow-up to the classic film series “The Evil Dead,” and is shepherded by original director Sam Raimi, original star Bruce Campbell, and original producer Rob Tapert. Lawless is set to star as Ruby, described in the official press release as “a mysterious figure who is myopic in her quest to hunt down the source of the recent Evil outbreaks. The only problem: she believes that Ash (Bruce Campbell) is the cause of it all.”

    Lawless previously collaborated with Raimi and Tapert — who are executive producing “Ash” alongside Campbell — on fantasy series “Xena: Warrior Princess” (on which Campbell also cameoed) and “Spartacus,” which also aired on Starz. She also made a memorable recent turn on NBC sitcom “Parks and Recreation.”

    The official “Ash” synopsis, per the press release:

    Bruce Campbell will be reprising his role as Ash, the stock boy, aging lothario and chainsaw-handed monster hunter who has spent the last 30 years avoiding responsibility, maturity and the terrors of the Evil Dead. When a Deadite plague threatens to destroy all of mankind, Ash is finally forced to face his demons –personal and literal. Destiny, it turns out, has no plans to release the unlikely hero from its “Evil” grip.

    Ray Santiago, Dana DeLorenzo, and Jill Marie Jones also star. The series is expected to debut in late 2015.

    [via: TV by the Numbers]

    Photo credit: Getty Images

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