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Author
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Topic: Drag Me to Hell
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Tim Reed
Better Projection Pays
Posts: 5246
From: Northampton, PA
Registered: Sep 1999
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posted 06-14-2009 10:22 PM
Okay, this was the co-feature with "Pelham 1-2-3" at Becky's D/I, Berlinsville, PA, which I saw this weekend. I took it in stride as I don't normally care for these kinds of pictures. quote: Darryl Spicer This is horror comedy and if you laugh at it then it did it's job.
Wow, I did. Out loud. I thought it was unintentionally funny, though, like the bees coming out of the guy's mouth in "The Green Mile". I laughed out loud at that, too.
Btw, what's with scary movies and things going into, or coming out of, people's mouths?! What's up with that?
I hope Universal is actually going back to the old "solar system" logo! It was always my favorite. This is the second movie I've seen it on recently ("Land of the Lost" being the other).
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Stu Jamieson
Jedi Master Film Handler
Posts: 524
From: Buccan, Qld, Australia
Registered: Jan 2008
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posted 07-30-2009 08:20 AM
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 Gruelling Horror", despite being 10 years it's 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 judgement, 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.
7.5 out of 10.
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