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Oh ho, here we go. The Evil Dead is the film that launched every moviegoer’s favorite trilogy, except for Star Wars, Back to the Future, Lord of the Rings, the Indiana Jones movies and probably a few other trilogies, too. It’s the film that started Bruce Campbell on his rise to cult superstardom, which means he is slightly less famous than someone who is not a star at all. In short, it’s the film that is awesome.

Although I’m a total sell-out and declare the more mass-appealing Army of Darkness to be my favorite movie in the series, I’m still a big fan of this first one and it’s by far the most like a true horror movie. It’s become an underground classic in the years since its release, with a huge and fiercely devoted fanbase, and we basically owe it all to the determination of Bruce Campbell and director Sam Raimi to make a great monster movie and the palpable fun they had doing it.

The set-up is taken right from page one of The How-To Guide to Horror Movies: a small group of young friends, three chicks and two dudes, are alone in a spooky cabin in a spooky woods where all kinds of spooky things happen. In the cabin’s cellar our merry band finds the ancient Book of the Dead (bound in human skin and inked in blood!), along with a tape recording of a translation of the book’s key passages. Among the incantations on the tape is one invoking the spirits of the evil/dead things that live/are dead in the spooky woods, and the defenseless young people wisely decide to play the tape aloud.

And when the evil rises it does so in spectacular fashion. People start levitating and getting gross skin. Other people get weird kabuki makeup for no particularly obvious reason. Best of all, there is sexual assault by a tree. But I don’t want to spoil everything, so I’ll just present to you a little Q&A session about this awesome movie.

Q: Were you serious when you said “sexual assault by a tree?”

A: Yes. Yes I was. I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking that I’m just exaggerating things, that maybe some girl is running through the forest and a tree limb whacks across her chest and I’m giving it a sensational, yellow-journalism description. Nay nay. When I say to you “Yes, The Evil Dead features a scene of sexual assault by a tree,” I mean exactly what you’re refusing to let yourself believe. Trust me kids, that’s what happens, and you won’t want to miss it.

Q: This is really more of a comedy than a horror movie, isn’t it?

A: No way, Jose! While Evil Dead 2 started to give you a lot of goofy with your gore and Army of Darkness was basically a flat-out comedy, this first entry in the series is a genuine attempt at a scary movie, complete with jump-out surprises, violence, rolling fog and a lot of “building the tension” scenes.

Q: But Bruce Campbell is a wise-crackin’ badass, right?

A: Again, no. In this movie, Ash (Bruce Campbell’s character) is little more than a freaked out cry-baby. He didn’t begin spouting off one-liners that would be immortalized in talking bobblehead dolls and acting like a super-cool hero until later in the series. In this he’s a standard scared kid out of his element and forced to decapitate his girlfriend, as so many of us have been before him.

Q: But he does have a really big chin, though, correct?

A: This I cannot deny.

Q: I’ve heard rumors that this movie is really, really loud. Is this true?

A: Unfortunately, yes, much of the picture is way too loud. Once the evil wackiness really starts taking hold of people, it’s pretty much non-stop screaming and hollering. Some people scream in fear, others scream weird taunts about wanting to swallow souls, but it all boils down to the same thing: everyone shouting at the top of their voice for an hour and a half. Plus, the unseen evil presence within the woods makes a really loud rumble/yawn sound every time it moves around. You’ll definitely want to watch a lot of this movie with the volume down low.

Q: So, does this movie kick ass or what?

A: God, yes. When you get right down to it, this movie is wonderful. It’s hard to describe, but it deserves its cult status as king of the B horror movies. Back before Sam Raimi was a mainstream Hollywood hotshot, he was coming up with one innovation after another in terms of staging and camera moves and all the technical aspects of film making, and he pulled out all the stops in this movie and its first sequel. From start to finish, The Evil Dead is a great example of how independent filmmakers on a limited budget can make something really incredible as long as they put in plenty of hard work and creativity and never stop enjoying themselves.

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