Sam Raimi and Bruce Campbell are not in this documentary. Sam was busy making Spider-man 3 and as for Bruce....... well, I think it was for the best that he wasn't interviewed. Because poor Bruce has been talking about Evil Dead for 2 decades. You'd be sick of talking about it too if you were him.
However, Bruce and Sam are on the Blu ray commentary and explain their experiences on that.
It's nice to hear from the rest of the cast and crew, though.
The doc opens with the crew explaining how they met Sam and that some of them were friends with the Raimis. They all made super 8 movies together and Sam and his brother Ivan had the idea of making a feature film that was better than the rubbish shown at drive-ins.
So the film was shot in Tennessee, in a abandoned cabin in the forest in the middle of nowhere. It was freezing cold and the cabin had no heat or water. The cast and crew had to stay in the cabin for 6 weeks.
Tom Sullivan did the make up effects and said that he used acrylic paint for the make up. You're not supposed to put that on your skin.
Ellen Sandweiss talks about how she was injured whilst running through the forest, in the cold, wearing nothing but a shirt and underwear.
For the scene where Ash hits the possessed Linda with the beam, Sam was actually the one using the beam off camera and decked Betsy Barker on the chin. After filming that scene, Sam said to Rob Tapert "I realised that we should've beaten her naked."
After 3 weeks, the actors, except Bruce, went home. So the shots of the possessed friends from behind were actually stand-ins. Members of the crew and close friends doubled the actors.
Then there's talk about how the film didn't really do well in cinemas, but was a hit on video in the US.
The UK however banned the film and was considered as a video nasty. Sam Raimi went to Leeds court to defend the films. And he won the case, with support from Palace Pictures of course. See "Discovering The Evil Dead" for that one.
Edgar Wright and Eli Roth discuss their love for the film. Edgar of course referenced Evil Dead in his work and Eli said that this film was the influence for Cabin Fever.
Despite it not being very original, but more famous for it's graphic violent content, Joe Bob Briggs explains that many people copy this film and keep making cheep rip-offs.
Rob Tapert said that his wife, Lucy Lawless, saw the film at 17 and said however was involved with that film should be locked up. Little did she know.......
An interesting documentary for fans.
