This review may contain spoilers. I can handle the truth.
DisposableMiffy’s review published on Letterboxd:
This review may contain spoilers.
One of this year's more pleasant surprises so far. I enjoy all Evil Dead movies to varying degrees, but the trailer for this one looked so generic that I had no intention of seeing it at the cinema. But I felt like going to the movies, so I went anyway.
And let me say, the trailer doesn't do Evil Dead Rise justice at all. Sure, it won't win any prizes for originality, but it's thoroughly entertaining throughout and gets rather nasty toward the end. I like the high-rise setting, there's plenty of blood and crude violence, and - always a plus in a movie - fucking kids are getting killed. When the film started and it became clear who the main characters would be (a single mother, her three children and her sister), I was almost certain they wouldn't go there. Luckily they did, though.
Speaking of the kids, did the casting director have a stroke? Not only do they not even remotely look like their mother - which would be fine, maybe they look like their father - but they also don't bear any resemblance to each other. Which also could be explained by them having different fathers, but the film specifically mentions them having one (deadbeat) father. Fucking hack job. Curiously though, the actresses portraying the adult sisters I totally bought as being related by blood. Lily Sullivan and Alyssa Sutherland also carry the film almost entirely on their own. Once she's possessed, Sutherland is creepy as hell, while Sullivan believably walks the fine line between being in over her head, scared shitless, but persevering and ultimately coming out on top.
Love the final act. Blood and gore ramp up significantly, drenching the screen in red, including a nice, little homage to The Shining. And when the chainsaw and the wood chipper popped up, I cheered.
Evil Dead Rise is not a masterpiece, but solid horror entertainment, and I wouldn't mind seeing Lily Sullivan reprising her role in future installments.
