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Drag Me To Hell
After a string of mediocre ‘horror’ films over the last few years, here comes horror-meister-turned-respectable director, Sam Raimi, to show them all exactly how it's done. The fact that Raimi can deliver a horror movie ostensibly about a cursed button and not have it look completely ludicrous is testament to the man's mastery of the craft. Drag Me To Hell also affords him a level of redemption from the slapstick misfire of Army Of Darkness, replete as it was with special effects that were astonishingly inferior to his seminal ‘video nasty’, The Evil Dead, "the Ultimate Experience in Grueling Horror", despite being ten years its junior.
Raimi knows what makes horror tick; he cut his teeth on it. Demonstrating his mastery of the genre, he plays on our insecurities in acting against our better judgment, expertly utilising flies, body fluids, unworldly yet strangely familiar sounds, creative shadow play, obtuse camera angles and syncopated editing to great effect. Menace is created in the most innocuous of elements - leaves blowing in the wind, creaky gate hinges and shifting furniture. Hippy wind chimes are liberally rattled, violin strings are duly screeched. Meticulously engineered ‘false relief’ devices, which are not always followed by a legitimate ‘scare’, keep the tension palpable and the scares unpredictable. These are readily recognisable Raimi trademarks but spotting them is half the fun and they never fail to deliver the requisite tension regardless.
Numerous nods to his Evil Dead movies abound like the strangely familiar voice on Christine's (Alison Lohman) self-help tape, a starring role for his rusty old yellow Oldsmobile and a knowing reference to a holiday in a remote cabin; the only thing missing is a Bruce Campbell cameo!
While Drag Me To Hell doesn't break the mould in horror film making, which is slightly disappointing because The Evil Dead did, it's certainly a worthy study in how a horror movie ought to be made. Prospective horror directors take note.
Stuart Jamieson
www.dragmetohell.net
Drag Me to Hell Movie Trailer
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