Evil Dead

Despite much old-school splatter, it's seldom frightening and oddly unfunny.

An effectively relentless gore-fest.

Five years from now, will you want to watch this bloody $14 million extravaganza or Raimi's shoestring original, which was Amateur Hour elevated to pop art? Evil Dead just bleeds money.

A stylish and worthy homage: inventive even as it is derivative, never quite jokey but never taking itself too seriously, and clocking in at an entirely appropriate 91 minutes. Any longer would be unmerciful; any shorter, ungenerous.

Though it never channels the raw DIY energy of the original Evil Dead series -- what big-budget version could? -- this polished, clever remake remains true to the spirit of the original, which was at once viscerally terrifying and weirdly lighthearted.

A gore fest that's just effective enough to whet fans' appetite for a sequel, even as it kills everyone else's appetite for dinner.

This Evil Dead remake is more 'blah' than 'boo.'

Alvares nails it. His Evil Dead has the fun spirit of the original (you need to have a very particular sense of the word fun, of course). His camerawork is inventive, occasionally beautiful.

The current reboot feels uncreative. Watching the new film just made me miss Bruce Campbell's chin and shots of Raimi running insane through the woods.

The screenplay is abysmal, the performances are lifeless, and Alvarez's direction does nothing but rip pages out of Raimi's playbook.

It's gross and creepy and precisely the sort of horror movie your mother would probably hate.

If you wondered what the "Evil Dead" movies might be like without the central wit and charisma of Bruce Campbell, the answer now awaits you.