February 17^th, 2000

"THOSE WACKY DETROIT BOYS"

For this grab bag we head to the Northerly state of Michigan and we zero in on its biggest city, Detroit. It's here that Sam Raimi, Bruce Campbell, Josh Becker and Scott Spiegel met and became friends. It's here that one of the most inspired, oft-copied no-budget cult classic of the 80's was made. That film, 1982's Evil Dead has now reached legendary status; not to mention spawning two sequels.

This week we'll look at three films that involved this quartet of friends, starting with the obvious and ending with a slash.

The Evil Dead [1982] started as a film made by a group of Michigan University students. But after exposure from such well-known names as Stephen King it was picked-up by distribution by New Line Cinema. Little did they know it would become considered a classic of the genre.

The tale of a group of friends off at a cabin in the remote woods being taken-over by demons isn't a new one, to be sure; but it was because of Raimi's kinetic camerawork, Campbell's likeable screen presence and some over-the-top gore that made this one hum with entertainment and gruesome fun.

Plus it introduced us to the character Ash, who in the sequels became a macho chainsaw-handed bad-ass who took no demon crap.

Thou Shalt Not Kill...Except [1985] is another low-budget horror/thriller and the only one of our trio to involve all four of the friends. Directed by Becker, who also co-wrote with Spiegel (based on a story by Campbell) and starring Raimi as a wacky Charles Manson-like cult leader; this revenge epic about some Vietnam vets going after a murderous Hippie cult looks cheap at times and isn't afraid to use stock footage; but where else can you see a bunch of well-done deaths, get tons of quotable lines (My favourite being when Raimi tells a follower, played by brother Ted: "Don't ever touch the sacrifical fluids...okey dokey?") and a generally grimy effort.

Plus you can now snag a widescreen collector's edition from Anchor Bay.

Intruder [1988] is a well-done slasher flick that got plentyful coverage in Fangoria before it came out due to video distributor Paramount cutting out all the gore. Directed by Spiegel, this one's set in a supermarket after-hours and has the staff getting butchered one-by-one by what's supposed to be (but is obvious to the audience) a mysterious killer. Even with the cuts it's still an efficently directed effort with well-stage murders, however if you can see the uncut version you'll get to bask in the glory of the "band-saw head in half" and "head crushing" scenes. Plus we can't forget to mention Danny Hicks hammy performance and a neat twist ending. And we also get to see Campbell cameo as a cop.

And what did the future hold for these friends? Well, Raimi moved on to more mainstream fare directing Darkman, the amazing A Simple Plan and For Love Of Game not to mention executive producing TV's Xena and Hercules. Campbell is still a character actor mainstay doing the odd low-budget horror/sci-fi project and making plentyful cameos on Raimi's two shows (and let's not forget the failed, but good, Brisco County, Jr.). Spiegel most recently directed the sequel to From Dusk Till Dawn and continued with his penchant for odd camera angles. Becker directed the movie Lunatics:A Love Story with Sam's brother Ted.