Uruguayan director Fede Alvarez joined a very elite club a couple of years back with his remake of The Evil Dead. Sam Raimi’s 1981 classic is hallowed ground for film fans, and everyone expected Alvarez’s version to be another shameless, lazy cash grab by cynical Hollywood moneymen.
Instead, like Zack Snyder with Dawn of the Dead and Jon Favreau with The Jungle Book, he proved it’s possible to stand apart from and in some ways even better a beloved original movie.
Alvarez’s The Evil Dead gave the premise a well-designed contemporary subtext, it didn’t scrimp on the grime and gore, the practical effects had a hand-made charm, and it was as scary as f&%k.
The other elite club he joins is that of filmmakers like James Wan (The Conjuring, Insidious) and Oren Peli (Paranormal Activity), who leveraged horror’s potential for low budgets against the love audiences have for the genre to launch hundred million dollar franchises.
Click here to read the rest of this story.