Saturday, 27 October 2012

The Evil Dead


The Evil Dead is an American horror film franchise created by Sam Raimi. The films revolve around the Necronomicon Ex-Mortis, a fictional Sumerian text which wreaks havoc upon a group of cabin inhabitants in a wooded area in Tennesee. The protagonist, Ashley J. "Ash" Williams, played by Bruce Campbell, is the only character left alive by the end of the series. The original series includes The Evil Dead (1981), Evil Dead II (1987), and Army of Darkness (1992). The franchise has since expanded into other formats such as video games and comic books. A musical opened in Toronto in 2003 containing material from all three films, and a remake of the first film is currently in development and due for release in 2013.


Development

Within the Woods
In January 1979 Bruce Campbell was a college dropout who had just quit his job as a taxicab driver. Sam Raimi was studying literature at Michigan State University with Robert Tapert finishing his economics degree. While putting the finishing touches on It's Murder! Tapert suggested doing a feature length film to Raimi. Raimi felt it to be impossible citing that they could never pull off the funding. Campbell did not mind stating that "I could always move back home." Tapert was fearing that he would become an expert in fisheries/wildlife while Raimi was afraid that he would go back to work at his dad's home furnishing store. These were the practical reasons that convinced the three to put forth a feature length film.The three were highly supportive fans of the comedy genre, though they decided not to do such a film as they felt "a feature-length yuck fest just didn't compute". To do the film as a horror was put forth after they were inspired by a well noted scene from It's Murder. This moved Raimi to write the short film Clockwork. The three felt the end result was very effective and represented a new direction that their films could take, that of a semi-successful horror film.
 

This would later lead to research of low-budget horror films at the local drive-in theater. The many films that they watched were the "two films for two dollars", allowing them the chance to document the behavior of what would become their target audience. Campbell quoted, "the message was very clear: Keep the pace fast and furious, and once the horror starts, never let up. 'The gorier the merrier' became our prime directive." Films that were witnessed amongst them included Massacre at Central High and Revenge of the Cheerleaders. The idea to do a "prototype" was commissioned, to prove not only to themselves, but also to potential investors that they were capable of doing a full length horror film. The same year, at Michigan State, Raimi had been studying H. P. Lovecraft and was most impressed with Necronomicon, or simply The Book of the Dead. From these rough concepts, he concocted a short story where a group of four friends unwittingly dig up an Indian burial ground and unleash horrific spirits and demons.In the spring of 1979 filming of Within the Woods started over a three day weekend on a budget of $1,600.

Within the Woods, as well as serving as a prototype, had impressed the filmmakers. For a marketing strategy a screening was arranged at their former high school, with a positive response.
 

Financing
Filming was first commissioned for the summer of 1979 in Michigan. In order to organize the budget, Sam Raimi, Robert Tapert and Bruce Campbell bought a few "how to make an independent film" guide publications. The budget was originally centered on $150,000 while shooting with a Super 8 camera. However, due to technical difficulties, it was decided to move it up to 16 mm format, as they wanted to film the project in the style of the many low-budget films at the time that had come out in the 1970s. Since they had little experience in the film industry, the three felt they should buy business suits and briefcases as a means to convince investors that they "had all the answers." A man named Andy Grainger, who was a friend of Tapert and owner of a series of movie theaters, was the first primary investor. He stated, "Fellas, no matter what, just keep the blood running." As a tribute to him, there's a scene in the finished film where an old film projector whirs to life and "projects" blood running down the screen.


Most importantly, Grainger provided the name of a distributor in New York City whom they could approach for possible distribution. The company was Levitt-Pickman Films, who most recently was famous for Groove Tube, starring a very young Chevy Chase. The filmmakers took a train at $40 each, as they knew none of their cars could make an entire round trip road trip. One of Campbell's old girlfriends named Andrea allowed them to stay at her apartment. Campbell slept with her while Raimi and Tapert were in the living room. Andrea's cat fell asleep on Raimi's face without even disturbing him. Raimi, who is allergic to cats, had his eyes swollen shut.
 
 
Evil Dead (2013 film)
 has been confirmed that a remake would be made of The Evil Dead. It will be produced by Bruce Campbell and Sam Raimi, but will not include the Ash character. It was also said that the movie would be about a group of teenagers that go to the cabin and find the book, and the similarities with the original would end there.
However, in August 2007, Bruce Campbell revealed in a radio interview that the proposed remake was "going nowhere" and "fizzled" due to extremely negative fan reaction.
 
2013 EVIL DEAD REMAKE
 
 
More recently, rumors have suggested that a re-write of a script is being reviewed and Bruce Campbell suggested that in true style of Sam Raimi's films he would do a cameo role, jokingly suggesting that it would be a remake/sequel and Knowby's ghost would be replaced by ghostly Ash.
In July 2008, Raimi stated that he intends to work with his brother Ivan in the development of a sequel, not a remake, and Campbell further supported this by saying that The Evil Dead remake was no longer a possibility.
In April 2011, Bruce Campbell did an AskMeAnything interview on Reddit.com, saying "Newsflash: We are remaking Evil Dead. The script is awesome. I will be one of the producers and possibly play the milk man". He added "In all honesty, we would all love to make another Evil Dead movie. When that will happen? Who can say – we're all working on other jobs right now. We're not trying to dodge anybody's questions, there just isn't that much to talk about. The remake's gonna kick ass – you have my word".On July 13, 2011 it was officially announced, via a press release, that Ghost House Pictures would be producing the upcoming remake of The Evil Dead, with Diablo Cody in the process of revising the script and Fede Alvarez chosen as the director. Actor Shiloh Fernandez is reported cast as the main lead role of David.Bloody Disgusting has reported that Lily Collins is in the lead role as Mia who is a female version of Ash, but on January 24, 2012, Collins has dropped out of the role. On February 3, 2012 it was announced that actress Jane Levy, star of the television series Suburgatory would be replacing Collins in the lead role as Mia. Lou Taylor Pucci, Elizabeth Blackmore and Jessica Lucas have joined the cast for the horror film.
 
On August 1, 2012, it was announced that in honor of the remake due out in 2013, The Evil Dead is coming to the world's largest Halloween event, Knott's Berry Farm's "Halloween Haunt" in Buena Park, CA, also known as Knott's Scary Farm. Knott's has a large log flume ride that goes in and around a large mountain, where the movie will be created for guest to experience the terror firsthand.
Fede Alvarez confirmed the film will use practical effects like the original film and no CGI was used in the scenes shown in the trailer at New York Comic Con. He has stated the special effects in the film are similar to magic and illusion tricks.


 
An official trailer for the film was released on October 24, 2012. Many familiar elements of the original film are revealed, such as the possessed arm and the infamous tree rape scene, as well as new scenes involving blood-rain and one of the possessed characters splitting their tongue with a utility knife. The trailer was given a red-band status for its excessive use of gore and profanity.

The Evil Dead 1981
 
 
The Evil Dead is a 1981 American horror film written and directed by Sam Raimi, starring Bruce Campbell, Ellen Sandweiss, and Betsy Baker. Raimi produced his earlier short film Within the Woods as a "prototype" to build the interest of potential investors. After asking a wide variety of investors, Raimi secured $90,000 to produce The Evil Dead. The film was shot on location in a remote cabin located in Morristown, Tennessee, a filming process which was very unconformable and difficult for a majority of the crew. The film is a story of five college students vacationing in an isolated cabin in a wooded area. Their vacation becomes gruesome when they find an audiotape that releases demons, who one by one possess each member of the group, leading to increasingly gory mayhem.
 
 
The low budget horror film attracted the interest of producer Irvin Shapiro, who helped screen the film at the 1982 Cannes Film Festival. Author Stephen King gave a rave review of the film, which generated the interest of New Line Cinema who helped distribute the film. While a meager commercial success domestically, the film made its budget back through world wide distribution. During its theatrical run the film grossed $2.4 million. Contemporary critical reception was positive, though years later the film built a much larger reputation. It currently holds a 100% positive rating on Rotten Tomatoes and has developed a reputation as one of the largest cult films. It has been cited amongst the greatest horror films of all time.
 
The film has spawned a media franchise, beginning with two sequels directed by Raimi; Evil Dead II (1987) and Army of Darkness (1992). It has received a video game and comic book franchise, and the film's protagonist, Ash Williams, has become a cult icon. A direct remake, with no involvement with Raimi, is planned for release in 2013. The Evil Dead launched the careers of Campbell and Raimi, who would collaborate on several films together throughout the years, including Raimi's Spider-Man trilogy. A fourth sequel has been rumored for years, but Campbell has often denied plans to continue the franchise
 
Development
Director Sam Raimi had grown up with Bruce Campbell, the two of them forming a friendship at a very young age. The duo directed several low budget, Super 8 mm film projects together. Several of the films they worked on were comedies, including Clockwork and It's Murder!. Shooting a suspense scene in It's Murder! inspired Raimi to approach a career in the horror genre, and after doing some research of horror cinema at drive-in theaters, Raimi was set on directing a horror film. His first was the short film Within the Woods, which was a "prototype" to help attract the interest of potential investors.The idea was to shoot a short film first, which would attract the interest of producers, and then use the money gained from that to shoot a full length project.Within the Woods was produced for $1600 dollars, but for The Evil Dead, Raimi needed over $100,000.
 
To generate funds for the film, Raimi approached Phil Gillis, a lawyer to one of his friends.Raimi showed him Within the Woods, and though Gillis was not impressed by the short film, he offered Raimi legal advice on how to produce the film. With his advice in mind, Raimi asked a wide variety of people for donations, and even eventually "begged" some people.Campbell had to ask several members of his own family and Raimi asked every individual he thought could have been interested.He eventually raised enough money to produce a full length film, though he had not generated the full amount that he initially had wanted.
With enough money to produce the film, Raimi and Campbell set out to make the movie, at the time titled Book of the Dead, inspired by Raimi's interest in the writer HP Lovecraft. The film was supposed to be a remake of their prior film Within the Woods, with higher production values and with a full length running time. Before shooting began, Raimi had just turned 20, and he considered the project as his "rite of passage
 
 
Pre-production
Raimi asked help and assistance from several of his friends and past collaborators to make The Evil Dead.To acquire actors for the project, an ad in the The Detroit News was placed. Betsy Baker was one of the actresses who responded to the ad, and Ellen Sandweiss, who appeared in Within the Woods, was also cast. Campbell was cast as the main character Ash Williams, and the crew consisted almost entirely of friends and family or Raimi and Campbell. The make-up adviser for Within the Woods, Tom Sulivan, was brought on to compose the effects after expressing a positive impression of working with Raimi.
Without any formal assistance from location scouts, the cast had to find filming locations on their own. The crew initially attempted to shoot the film in Raimi's hometown of Royal Oak, Michigan, but instead chose Morristown, Tennessee, because it was the only state which expressed enthusiasm in the project.They quickly found a remote cabin located several miles away from any other buildings.During pre-production, the 13 member crew had to stay at the cabin, leading to several people sleeping in the same room. The living conditions were notoriously difficult, with several arguments breaking out between crew members.
 
Steve Frankel was the only carpenter on set, which made him the only contributor to the art direction. For exterior shots, Frankel had to produce several elaborate props with a circular saw. Otherwise, the cabin mostly remained the way it was found during production. The cabin had no plumbing, however phone lines had been set up

Filming
Because of the inexperienced nature of the crew, filming was a "comedy of errors".The very first day of filming lead to the crew getting lost in the woods during a scene shot on a bridge.Several members of the crew ended up getting injured during the shoot, and because of the remoteness of the cabin, it made securing medical help very difficult.One notably gruesome moment on set involved the ripping off of Baker's eyes lashes during the removal of her face-mask.Because of how low the budget was, in order to achieve an infect involving "demonic eyes", contact lenses as thick as glass had to be applied to the actors.The lenses took 10 minutes to apply, and could only be left on for about 15 minutes because eyes could not "breath" with them applied. Campbell later commented that to get the effect of wearing these lenses, you had to put "tupperware" over your eyes.
 

Raimi quickly developed a sense of mise en scène, coming up with ideas for scenes in a fast rate.He had drawn several crude illustrations to help him break down the flow of scenes. The crew was surprised when Raimi began utilizing dutch angles during shots to build atmosphere during scenes.In order to to accommodate Raimi's style of direction, low budget rigs had to be produced. One involved the "vas-o-cam", which relied on a mounted camera which could be slide down long wood platforms to create a more fluent sense of motion. Since the crew could not afford a camera dolly, several elaborate, low-budget rigs had to be built
Another less elaborate effect had to be done by mounting the camera to a piece of wood and having the camera-man sprint around the swamp. During scenes involving the unseen "force" in the woods watching the characters, Raimi had to run through the woods with the camera strapped to a piece of a wood, jumping over logs and stones.This often proved difficult, because of mist in the swamp. The final scene of the film was shot with the camera mounted to a bike, while it was quickly driven through the cabin to create a seamless long take. The scene was highly difficult to film safely, and it ended with Campbell being run over with the bike. Reportedly he suffered a life long injury on his chin when the bike crashed into him.
 
Because Raimi had been a big fan of the The Three Stooges franchise during his youth, it inspired him to use "fake shemps" during production. In any scene that required a background shot of a character, to save time he would use another actor to substitute if the original actor was pre-occupied. During a close-up involving Richard DeManicor's hand opening a curtain, Raimi used his own hand in the scene since it was more convenient. His brother Ted Raimi was used as a substitute in many scenes when the original actor was either busy or preoccupied.
Raimi famously enjoyed "torturing" his actors. He believed that to capture pain and anger in his actors, he had to abuse them a little at times, lamenting "if everyone was in extreme pain and misery, that would translate into a horror." Producer Robert Tapert agreed with Raimi, commenting that he "enjoyed when an actor bleeds." While shooting a scene with Campbell running down a hill, he tripped and injured his leg. Raimi enjoyed poking Campbell's injury with a stick he found in the woods. Because of the copious amounts of blood in the film, the crew had to produce gallons of fake blood with karo syrup. So much blood had been used during filming, that Campbell took hours to remove the substance from him, which was also sticky.Several of the actors had inadvertently been stabbed or thrown into objects during production.
 
On the last few days on set, the conditions had gotten so poor that out of desperation the crew began burning furniture to stay warm. Since only exterior shots needed to be filmed at that point, they burned nearly every piece of of furniture left. Several actors went days without showering, and because of the freezing cold conditions, several of them caught colds and other illnesses. Campbell later described the filming process as nearly "twelve weeks of mirthless exercise in agony", though he mused that he did manage to have fun while on set. On January 23, 1980, filming was finished and almost every single member of the crew left the set to return home, with Campbell staying with Raimi. While looking over the footage that had been shot, Raimi discovered that a few pick-ups were required to fill in missing shots. Four days of reshoots were then done to complete the film. The final moment involved Campbell having "monster-guts" splattered on him in the basement
 
Editing
After the extensive filming process, Raimi had a "mountain of footage" that he had to put together. He chose a Detroit editing association to cut the film, which is where he met Edna Paul. Paul's assisiant was Joel Coen of the Coen brothers, who helped with the editing of the film.Paul edited a majority of the film, although Coen notably edited the shed sequence. Coen had been inspired by Raimi's Within the Woods and liked the idea of producing a prototype film to help build the interest of investors. He utilized the concept to help make Blood Simple, and him and Raimi became friends following the editing process.
The first cut of the film ran at around 117 minutes, which Campbell commented was an impressive achievement because the screenplay itself was only 65 minutes. It was then edited down to a more marketable 85 minutes.One of the most intricate moments of editing was the stop motion sequence where the corpses "melted", which took hours to cut properly.The film had unique sound requirements which required extensive recording from the crew. Several sounds were not recorded properly during shooting, which meant that several sound effects had to be redone in the editing rooms. Dead chickens needed to be stabbed to replicate the sounds of mutilated flesh, and Campbell had to scream into a microphone for several hours. Raimi was inspired by the fact that Brian De Palma was editing his own film Blow Out with John Travolta at the same sound facility.
Much like Within the Woods, The Evil Dead needed to be blown up to 35mm in order to be played at movie theaters.35mm was the industry standard at the time, though this was a much simpler process than it was on Within the Woods because of a larger budget to develop the film properly
 
 
Promotion and distribution
With the film completed, Raimi and the crew decided to celebrate with a "big premiere." They chose to screen the film at the Redford Theatre in Detroit, which was a theater that Campbell had visited often as a child.Raimi opted to have the most theatrical premiere that he could, using custom tickets, wind tracks set in the theater, and ordering ambulances outside of the theater to build atmosphere.The premiere was inspired by horror director William Castle, who would often attempt to scare his audiences utilizing gimmicks. Local turnout for the premiere exceeded the expectations of the cast, with a thousand patrons showing up. The audiences responded enthusiastically to the premiere, which lead to Raimi's idea of "touring" the film around to build hype.
 
Raimi showed the film to essentially anyone who was willing to watch it, booking meetings with distribution agents and anyone with experience in the film industry. Eventually Raimi came along Irvin Shapiro, the man who was responsible for the distribution of George A. Romero's Night of the Living Dead and various other famous horror films. Upon first viewing the film, he joked that while it "wasn't Gone with the Wind", it had commercial potential and expressed an interest in distributing it.It was his idea not to use the then-title Book of the Dead, because it made the film sound boring. Raimi brainstormed several ideas, eventually going with The Evil Dead which was deemed the "least worst". Shapiro also gave the advice to distribute the film worldwide to garner larger income, though it required a further financial investment by Raimi, who managed to scrap together what little money he had
 
Shapiro was one of founders of Cannes Film Festival, and allowed Raimi to screen the film at the 1982 festival out of competition. Stephen King was present at its screening gave the film a rave review. USA Today released an article about King's favorite horror films; the author cited The Evil Dead as his fifth favorite film of the genre.The film had a severe impact on King, who commented that while watching the film at Cannes, "he was registering things he had never seen in a movie before".He became one of the film's largest supporters during the early parts of finding a distributor, eventually describing it as the "most ferociously original film of the year", which was used in promotional pieces for the film. The comments by King attracted the interest of critics, who likely otherwise would have dismissed the low budget thriller.
 
The film's press attracted the attention of Stephen Woolley, a British film distribution agent. Though he considered the film a big risk, he decided to take on the job of releasing the film in in the United Kingdom.The film was was promoted in an unconventional manner for a film of its budget, receiving marketing that usually only larger budget films received. Dozens of promotional pieces including film posters and trailers were widely showcased in the United Kingdom; such heavy promotion which rarely would have been expended on a low budget film. Woolley was impressed by Raimi, who he called "charming", and was actually an admirer of the film, which lead to him taking more risks with the promotion of the film than he normally would have.
Fangoria started covering the film in late 1982, writing several articles about the long production history of the film. Early critical reception at the time was very positive, and along with Fangoria, King, and Shapiro's approval, the film generated an impressive amount of interest before its commercial premiere. New Line Cinema was one of the distributors who took an interest in the film, and after negotiations, the company agreed to distribute the film domestically.The film had several "sneak previews" before its commercial release, including screenings in New York and Detroit. Audience reception at both screenings was widely enthusiastic, and enough interest was being built for the film that wider distribution was being planned. New Line Cinema wrote Raimi a cheque large enough to pay off all the investors, and decided to release the film in a unique manner. It was supposed to be released simultaneously into both cinemas and onto VHS, and received substantial domestic promotion
 
 
Commercial release
Because of a large promotional campaign, the film performed above expectations at the box office.It grossed a total of $2,400,000 worldwide, nearly eight times its production budget. In its first week of release, the film made £100,000 in the UK, and quickly became the best selling video release of its week. It became the largest video seller in the country that year, out grossing large budget horror releases like The Shining. The initial domestic gross was described as "disappointing."It opened in 15 theaters and grossed $108,000 in its opening weekend.Word of mouth later spread, and the film became a "sleeper hit", making over $600,000 domestically and nearly two million overseas. Its impressive European performance was chalked up to its heavy promotion there and the more open minded nature of audiences.
 
Its release was met with controversy. When the film was being filmed by Raimi, he made the film as gruesome as possible with no interest or fear in censorship. This lead to the film receiving the X rating and being cited as a video nasty.Films labeled as a "video nasty" were often highly violent and disturbing films that were widely controversial, a title often held by pornographic films and other X rated films.While The Evil Dead was not pornographic in nature, it was considered one of the most violent films of its time and censors had issues with the content of the film, which impacted some of its commercial potential. The film was called the "number one nasty", because while it was labeled as a video nasty, it also was the best selling video release of the year, and the most notorious film on the list.Along with Cannibal Holocaust and I Spit on Your Grave, writer Bruce Kawin described The Evil Dead as one of the most notorious splatter film of its day.The film was banned on video in some countries, however, it was never officially banned outright.
 
 
Evil Dead II 1987
 
 
Evil Dead II (referred to in publicity materials as Evil Dead 2: Dead by Dawn) is a 1987 American horror comedy directed by Sam Raimi and a sequel to the 1981 film The Evil Dead. The film was written by Raimi and Scott Spiegel, produced by Rob Tapert, and stars Bruce Campbell as Ash Williams. Raimi and Spiegel wrote the script during production of Crimewave.
Filming took place in Michigan and North Carolina in 1986 and the film was released in the United States on March 13, 1987. It was a minor box office success, achieving just under $6 million. As of July 26, 2006 (2006 -07-26), the total US box office gross is $10.9 million. It also received critical acclaim. Watchers praised Raimi for the direction and Campbell for his role in the film. Evil Dead II was eventually followed by the 1992 film Army of Darkness.
 
 
Production
The concept of a sequel to The Evil Dead was discussed during the location shooting on the first film. Sam Raimi wanted to toss his hero, Ash, through a time portal, back into the Middle Ages. That notion eventually led to the third installment, Army of Darkness.
After the release of The Evil Dead, Raimi moved on to Crimewave, a cross between a crime film and a comedy produced by Raimi and Joel and Ethan Coen. Irvin Shapiro, a publicist who was primarily responsible for the mainstream release of The Evil Dead, suggested that they next work on an Evil Dead sequel. Raimi scoffed at the idea, expecting Crimewave to be a hit, but Shapiro put out ads announcing the sequel regardless.
 
After Crimewave was released to little audience or critical acclaim, Raimi and Tapert, knowing that another flop would further stall their already lagging careers, took Shapiro up on his offer. Around the same time, they met Italian movie producer Dino De Laurentiis, the owner of production and distribution company DEG. He had asked Raimi if he would direct a theatrical adaptation of the Stephen King (written under his Richard Bachman pseudonym) novel Thinner. Raimi turned down the offer, but De Laurentiis continued to be interested in the young filmmaker.
 


The Thinner adaptation was part of a deal between De Laurentiis and King to produce several adaptations of King's successful horror fiction. At the time, King was directing the first such adaptation, Maximum Overdrive, based on his short story "Trucks". He had dinner with a crew member who had been interviewed about the Evil Dead sequel, and told King that the film was having trouble attracting funding. Upon hearing this, King, who had written a glowing review of the first film that helped it become an audience favorite at Cannes, called De Laurentiis and asked him to fund the film.
Though initially skeptical, De Laurentiis agreed after being presented with the extremely high Italian grosses for the first film. Although Raimi and Tapert had desired $4 million for the production, they were allotted only $3.6 million. As such, the planned medieval storyline had to be scrapped.


Script

Though they had only recently received the funding necessary to produce the film, the script had been written for some time, having been composed largely during the production of Crimewave. Raimi contacted his old friend Scott Spiegel, who had collaborated with Campbell and others on the Super-8 films they had produced during their childhood in Michigan. Most of these films had been comedies, and Spiegel felt that Evil Dead II should be less straight horror than the first. Initially, the opening sequence included all five characters from the original film, but, in an effort to save time and money, all but Ash and Linda were cut from the final draft.

 
Spiegel and Raimi wrote most of the film in their house in Silver Lake, Los Angeles, California, where they were living with the aforementioned Coen brothers, as well as actors Frances McDormand, Kathy Bates, and Holly Hunter (Hunter was the primary inspiration for the Bobby Jo character). Due both to the distractions of their house guests and the films they were involved with, Crimewave and Josh Becker's Thou Shalt Not Kill... Except, the script took an inordinately long time to finish.
Among the many inspirations for the film include The Three Stooges and other slapstick comedy films; Ash's fights with his disembodied hand come from a film made by Spiegel as a teenager, entitled Attack of the Helping Hand, which was itself inspired by television commercials advertising Hamburger Helper. The "laughing room" scene, where all the objects in the room seemingly come to life and begin to cackle maniacally along with Ash, came about after Spiegel jokingly used a gooseneck lamp to visually demonstrate a Popeye-esque laugh. Scott Spiegel's humorous influence can be seen throughout the film, perhaps most prominently in certain visual jokes; for instance, when Ash traps his rogue hand under a pile of books, on top is A Farewell to Arms.
 

Filming

With the script completed, and a production company secured, filming could begin. The production commenced in Wadesboro, North Carolina, not far from De Laurentiis' offices in Wilmington. De Laurentiis had wanted them to film in his elaborate Wilmington studio, but the production team felt uneasy being so close to the producer, so they moved to Wadesboro, approximately three hours away. Steven Spielberg had previously filmed The Color Purple in Wadesboro, and the large white farmhouse used as an exterior location in that film became the production office for Evil Dead II. Most of the film was shot in the woods near that farmhouse, or J.R. Faison Junior High School, which is where the interior cabin set was located.

 
The film's production was not nearly as chaotic or strange as the production of the original, largely because of Raimi, Tapert and Campbell's additional film making experience. However, there are nevertheless numerous stories about the strange happenings on the set. For instance, the rat seen in the cellar was nicknamed "Señor Cojones" by the crew ("cojones" is Spanish slang for "testicles").
Even so, there were hardships, mostly involving Ted Raimi's costume. Ted, director Sam's younger brother, had been involved in the first film briefly, acting as a fake Shemp, but in Evil Dead II he gets the larger role of the historian's demon-possessed wife, Henrietta. Raimi was forced to wear a full-body, latex costume, crouch in a small hole in the floor acting as a "cellar", or on one day, both. Raimi became extremely overheated, to the point that his costume was literally filled with liters of sweat; special effects artist Gregory Nicotero describes pouring the fluid into several Dixie cups so as to get it out of the costume. The sweat is also visible on-screen, dripping out of the costume's ear, in the scene where Henrietta spins around over Annie's head.
 
The crew also sneaked various in-jokes into the film itself, such as the clawed glove of Freddy Krueger, the primary antagonist of the A Nightmare on Elm Street series of slasher films, which hangs in the cabin's basement and toolshed. This was, at least partially, a reference to a scene in the original A Nightmare on Elm Street where the character Nancy Thompson (portrayed by Heather Langenkamp), watches the original Evil Dead on a television set in her room. In turn, that scene was a reference to the torn The Hills Have Eyes poster seen in the original Evil Dead film, which was itself a reference to a torn Jaws poster in The Hills Have Eyes.
At the film's wrap party, the crew held a talent contest, where Sam Raimi and Bruce Campbell sang The Byrds' "Eight Miles High", with Nicotero on guitar.
 

Release

Box office

Evil Dead II opened on March 13, 1987 to a weekend gross of $807,260. At this time, it was only in 310 theatres, resulting in its smaller gross. However, after spending a little over a month in theatres, the film ultimately grossed $5,923,044 domestically. Since then, the film has reached an estimated total of $10,900,000 in box office revenues.

Critical reception

Evil Dead II holds a 98% approval rating on the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, slightly less than The Evil Dead, which holds a 100% rating.On a similar website Metacritic, it holds a score of 69/100 (generally favorable) with a user rating of 9.2/10. Empire magazine praised the film saying "the gaudily gory, virtuoso, hyper-kinetic horror sequel/remake uses every trick in the cinematic book" and confirms that "Bruce Campbell and Raimi are gods" and Caryn James of The New York Times called it "genuine, if bizarre, proof of Sam Raimi's talent and developing skill." Leonard Maltin originally rated the film with two stars, but later increased the rating to three stars.

 

Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film a three star rating (out of four) describing it as "a fairly sophisticated satire." He praised the film's sense of surrealism, comedic timing, and "grubby, low-budget intensity." Ebert states that "if you know it's all special effects, and if you've seen a lot of other movies and have a sense of humor, you might have a great time at Evil Dead 2." Richard Harrington of the Washington Post wrapped up his review stating that "the acting is straight out of '50s B movies. The exposition is clumsy, the sound track corny, the denouement silly. Then again, who said bad taste was easy?"Conversely, Pat Graham of Chicago Reader disliked the mix of horror and comedy, writing in his review that "The pop-up humor and smirkiness suggest Raimi's aspiring to the fashionable company of the brothers Coen, though on the basis of this strained effort I'd say he's overshot the mark."

Entertainment Weekly ranked the film #19 on their list of "The Top 50 Cult Films". Sight and Sound ranked it #34 on their 50 Funniest Films of All Time list. In 2008, Empire magazine included Evil Dead II on their list of The 500 Greatest Movies of All Time, ranked #49.
 
Army of Darkness  1992
 
 
Army of Darkness is a 1992 American comedy horror film directed by Sam Raimi. It is the third and final installment in The Evil Dead trilogy. The film was written by Sam Raimi and his brother Ivan, produced by Robert Tapert, and stars Bruce Campbell and Embeth Davidtz. Continuing from Evil Dead II, Ash Williams is trapped in the Middle Ages and battles the undead in his quest to return to the present.
 
The film was produced as part of a production deal with Universal Studios after the financial success of Darkman. Filming took place in California in 1991. Army of Darkness premiered on October 9, 1992 at the Sitges Film Festival, and was released in the United States on February 19, 1993. It grossed $11.503 million domestically and another $10 million outside the USA for a total worldwide gross of $21.5 million. Critical response was positive, but with a much lower rating than the first two films. Since its video release it has acquired a massive cult following, along with the other two films in the trilogy. The film was dedicated to Irvin Shapiro.
 
 
Production
Plans to make a third Evil Dead film had been circulating for a number of years, even prior to the production of Darkman. Evil Dead II made enough money internationally that Dino De Laurentiis was willing to finance a sequel. Director and script writer Sam Raimi drew from a variety of sources, including literature with A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court and Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels and films like The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad, Jason and the Argonauts, and The Three Stooges. Evil Dead II, according to Bruce Campbell, "was originally designed to go back into the past to 1300, but we couldn't muster it at the time, so we decided to make an interim version, not knowing if the 1300 story would ever get made". Promotional drawings were created and published in Variety during the casting process before the budget was deemed too little for the plot. The working title for the project was Evil Dead III: Army of Darkness. The title "Army of Darkness" came from an idea by Irvin Shapiro, during the production of Evil Dead II.This was used after Sam Raimi was unable to use his original title "The Medieval Dead." ("The Medieval Dead" would later be used as the film's subtitle for its UK release as Army of Darkness: The Medieval Dead).
 

Screenplay and pre-production

Initially, Raimi invited Scott Spiegel to co-write Army of Darkness because he had done a good job on Evil Dead II, but he was busy on rewrites for the Clint Eastwood film The Rookie. After the good experience of writing the screenplay for a film called Easy Wheels, Sam and his brother Ivan Raimi decided to co-write the film together.They worked on the script throughout the pre-production and production of Darkman. After filming Darkman, they took the script out and worked on it in more detail. Raimi says that Ivan "has a good sense of character" and that he brought more comedy into the script. Campbell remembers, "We all decided, 'Get him out of the cabin.' There were earlier drafts where part three still took place there, but we thought, 'Well, we all know that cabin, it's time to move on.' The three of us decided to keep it in 1300, because it's more interesting". Campbell and Tapert would read the script drafts, give Raimi their notes and he would decide which suggestions to keep and which ones to discard.
 
The initial budget was $8 million but during pre-production, it became obvious that this was not going to be enough.Darkman was also a financial success and De Laurentiis had multi-picture deal with Universal and so Army of Darkness became one of the films. The studio decided to contribute half of the film's $12 million budget. However, the film's ambitious scope and its extensive effects work forced Campbell, Raimi and producer Rob Tapert to put up $1 million of their collective salaries to shoot a new ending and not film a scene where a possessed woman pushes down some giant pillars. Visual effects supervisor William Mesa showed Raimi storyboards he had from Victor Fleming's film Joan of Arc that depicted huge battle scenes and he picked out 25 shots to use in Army of Darkness. A storyboard artist worked closely with the director in order to blend the shots from the Joan of Arc storyboards with the battle scenes in his film.
 
Traci Lords was among the actresses auditioning for the film, saying in 2001, "I didn't get the part but I clicked with Bruce [Campbell]," with whom she would later work as a guest star in the TV series Hercules: The Legendary Journeys.

Principal photography

Principal photography took place between soundstage and on-location work. Army of Darkness was filmed in Bronson Canyon and Vasquez Rocks Natural Area Park. The interior shots were filmed on an Introvision stage in Hollywood. Raimi's use of the Introvision process was a tribute to the stop-motion animation work of Ray Harryhausen. Introvision uses front-projected images with live actors instead of the traditional rear projection that Harryhausen and others used. Introvision blended components with more realistic-looking results. To achieve this effect, Raimi used 60-foot-tall Scotchlite front-projection screens, miniatures and background plates.According to the director, the advantage of using this technique was "the incredible amount of interaction between the background, which doesn't exist, and the foreground, which is usually your character".
 
The shooting for Army of Darkness began in mid-1991, and it lasted for about 100 days. It was a mid-summer shoot and while on location on a huge castle set that was built near Acton, California on the edge of the Mojave Desert, the cast and crew endured very hot conditions during the day and very cold temperatures at night. Most of the film took place at night and the filmmakers shot most of the film during the summer when the days were longest and the nights were the shortest. It would take an hour and a half to light an area leaving the filmmakers only six hours left to shoot a scene.Money problems forced cinematographer Bill Pope to shoot only for certain hours Monday through Friday because he could not be paid his standard fee. Mesa shot many of the action sequences on the weekend.
It was a difficult shoot for Campbell who had to learn elaborate choreography for the battle scenes, which involved him remembering a number system because the actor was often fighting opponents that were not really there.Mesa remembers, "Bruce was cussing and swearing some of the time because you had to work on the number system. Sam would tell us to make it as complicated and hard for Bruce as possible. 'Make him go through torture!' So we'd come up with these shots that were really, really difficult, and sometimes they would take thirty-seven takes".Some scenes, like Evil Ash walking along the graveyard while his skeleton minions come to life, blended stop-motion animation with live skeletons that were mechanically rigged, with prosthetics and visual effects.
 
Soundtrack
 
Danny Elfman, who composed the score for Darkman, wrote the "March of the Dead" theme for Army of Darkness. After the re-shoots were completed, Joseph LoDuca, who composed the music for The Evil Dead and Evil Dead II, returned to score the film.LoDuca sat down with Raimi and they went over the entire film, scene by scene. The composer used his knowledge of synthesizers and was able to present many cues in a mock-up form before he took them in front of an orchestra.
 

Post-production

While Dino De Laurentiis gave Raimi and his crew freedom to shoot the movie the way they wanted, Universal Pictures took over during post-production. Universal was not happy with Raimi's cut because it did not like his original ending of the movie and felt that it was negative. A more upbeat ending was shot a month after Army of Darkness was made. It was shot in a lumber store in Malibu, California over three or four nights. Then, two months after Army of Darkness was finished, a round of re-shoots began in Santa Monica and involved Ash in the windmill and the scenes with Bridget Fonda done for very little money. Raimi recalls, "Actually, I kind of like the fact that there are two endings, that in one alternate universe Bruce is screwed, and in another universe he's some cheesy hero".



In addition, Raimi needed $3 million to finish his movie, but Universal was not willing to give him the money and delayed its release because they were upset that De Laurentiis would not give them the rights to the Hannibal Lecter character so that they could film a sequel to Jonathan Demme's The Silence of the Lambs. The matter was finally resolved, but Army of Darkness' release date had been pushed back from its original summer of 1992 release to February 1993.
 
For the movie's poster, Universal brought Campbell in to take several reference head shots and asked him to strike a sly look on his face. They showed him a rough of this Frank Frazetta-like painting. The actor had a day to approve it or, as he was told, there would be no ad campaign for the film. Raimi ran into further troubles with the Motion Picture Association of America over the film's rating. The MPAA gave it an NC-17 rating for a shot of a female Deadite being decapitated early on in the film. Universal, however, wanted a PG-13 rating, so Raimi made a few cuts and was still stuck with the MPAA's R rating. In response, Universal turned the film over to outside film editors who cut Army of Darkness to 81 minutes in length and another version running 87 minutes that was eventually released in theaters, ending up with an R rating as a result.
 
Release
Box office performance
 
Army of Darkness was released by Universal Pictures on February 19, 1993 in 1,387 theaters in the United States, grossing $4.4 million (38.5% of total gross) on its first weekend. In total, the film earned $11.5 million in the US.
 

Multiple Endings

The original ending, preferred by Sam Raimi and Bruce Campbell themselves, in which Ash oversleeps in the cave and wakes up in a post-apocalyptic future, was restored to the film for the UK VHS release, which also had the S-Mart ending put in as a post credit extra. This scene has been restored on the Army Of Darkness: Director's Cut (MGM Edition) (HK - DVD R3), the "directors cut bootleg edition" DVD and the double disk DVD, which also featured the S-Mart ending of the film. The S-Mart ending was shot for the American release; the studio wanted to end the film on a high note for the character of Ash. Raimi believed Ash to be more of a foul, which is why he liked to torture him so much in his films; Ash being a goof and drinking too much potion was in his character.
 

Critical reception

The film currently holds a 71% "Fresh" rating on the review aggregate website Rotten Tomatoes, based on 38 reviews, which made its critical reception above average but is much lower than The Evil Dead and Evil Dead II, which received 100% and 98% critical approval, respectively. On Metacritic, the film holds a score of 57 out of 100, indicating "mixed or average reviews". Roger Ebert gave the film two out of four stars and wrote, "The movie isn't as funny or entertaining as Evil Dead II, however, maybe because the comic approach seems recycled". In her review for the New York Times, Janet Maslin praised, "Mr. Campbell's manly, mock-heroic posturing is perfectly in keeping with the director's droll outlook". Desson Howe, in this review for the Washington Post praised the film's style: "Bill Pope's cinematography is gymnastic and appropriately frenetic. The visual and make-up effects (from artist-technicians William Mesa, Tony Gardner and others) are incredibly imaginative". However, Entertainment Weekly gave the film a "C+" rating and wrote, "This spoofy cast of thousands looks a little too much like a crew of bland Hollywood extras. By the time Army of Darkness turns into a retread of Jason and the Argonauts, featuring an army of fighting skeletons, the film has fallen into a ditch between parody and spectacle".


 
Awards
Army of Darkness won the Saturn Award for Best Horror Film (1994). It was also nominated for Best Make-Up. Army of Darkness was nominated for the Grand Prize at Avoriaz Fantastic Film Festival, and won the Golden Raven at the Brussels International Festival of Fantasy Film in 1993. The film also won the Critics' Award at Fantasporto, and was nominated for the International Fantasy Film Award in the category of Best Film in 1993. It was also nominated Best Film at the Sitges - Spanish International Film Festival
 
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