The new Evil Dead is all in, according to their first official poster

Fede Alvarez's Evil Dead is not messing around, as I learned during New York Comic Con this fall and as you may have learned when you saw the teaser trailer. But one look at the new poster (released via Yahoo! Movies) proves that these guys really mean business. They might also be putting their asses on the line with a pretty bold claim. After the jump, see the whole poster and judge for yourself: ballsy or brash?

And here it is:

What do you think? Tall order? Too tall? We'll find out in April 2013 how nice the emperor's new clothes really are...

Photo credit: Yahoo! Movies

(via The Daily Blam)

• [Soopermexican]

  Even the poster frightens me… 

  • [RVLouie]

    …with how wonderful that typography is.

  • [Antinous / Moderator]

    Looks a bit like Degas’ dancer statue.

• [5onthe5]

  Is there any evidence that the filmmakers of today understand what made the classic horrors memorable or frightening?

  I want to see Nolan, PTA, Duncan James do a straight-up horror. Then we might get somewhere.

  • [Reverend Loki]

    I still haven’t seen Cabin In The Woods, but by all reports I’ve heard it gets the horror part pretty well.  You might say the lighter, twist parts are even in line with the comedic schtick thrown into the Nightmare and Friday the 13th series, but better.

    I really need to get a hold of a copy to watch this one sometime soon.  

    • [Dr P Fenderson]

      You should certainly see it. I’m not really in agreement with what you say about getting “the horror part pretty well”. It’s more a meta look at the fundamental equations that modern, and to some extent classic, horror uses – and the history and archetypes behind the symbols used in horror films. I would actually compare it in some senses to Galaxy Quest, where it explores the tropes and symbols while actually telling a story using them. Very good film

• [Lexorin]

  To bad they thought evil dead 1 was the cult classic. People like evil dead 2 because it was goofy, fun, 80′s horror. This new film looks like more to serious modern torture porn.

  • [geekzapoppin]

     Evil Dead 1 *is* a cult classic. So is 2. They are very different films, though. The first is definitely nasty. Tree rape and pencil stabbed in the ankle, anyone? It’s far-gorier than you may remember.

• [Michael Curran]

  Too reminiscent of John Romero’s attempt to convert the game playing population into female dogs.

• [Gerald Mander]

  I think that by the time you’re in a position to agree or disagree, they have your ten bucks. Which is the poster’s mission.

• [Ernest Valdemar]

  You call that marketing? Will there be nurses on duty in case I pass out? Do I have to sign a waiver releasing the theater from liability? Will there be life insurance policies in case I die of fright? Free airsickness bags? That’s how you oversell a horror film.

  Just keep telling yourself, “It’s only a slogan … it’s only a slogan … it’s only a slogan …”

  • [OakCliffClavin]

    Don’t give them ideas. It hasn’t come out yet, they may do all that and more.

• [Saif Ansari]

  Bah humbug.

  Different people find different things frightening. But they just want their budget back so they’ll claim whatever.

  Gorenography doesn’t particularly do much for me other than make me squirm. The Japanese horror films are a lot more in line for me, or western takes like The Others or Alien. Or David Lynch. or Von Trier’s Antichrist. I don’t know.

  Texas Chainsaw Massacre worked for reasons other than the gore. That’s why the Hostel/Saw/Centipede/whathaveyou franchises are just missing the point despite their desire to bathe the screen in blood.

  Maybe I’m just old. Get off my lawn, or something.

• [andygates]

  Is that a grisly, gristly stump I spy?  Lady Ash?  If they can pull off a badass genderflip the way BSG did Starbuck, I’m all in, in spades, with my car keys.

• [Damian Barajas]

  No. Just No.

• [David Hill]

  Meh. Sam Raimi grew up between Evil Dead and Evil Dead 2. The “tree rape” scene in ED1 was changed for ED2, and didn’t allude to rape. I’m tired of rape as shock element. For men, the worst thing that happens is they die. For women, the worst thing that happens is that someone forces them into sex, then they die. Absolutely sick of it. 

  • [benher]

    Never saw Deliverance I take it?

  • [dbt]

    pulp fiction?

• [benher]

  I’m gonna have to go with “brash.”

  The typography rules but the ad copy is a shitstain on an otherwise awesome poster. 

  Also, die-hard cult fans, get some perspective. 
  This is a new, different film. 
  Bruce fucking Cambell himself descended to the mortal plane to appeal to your sensibilities. 

• [Halloween_Jack]

  The most terrifying film that I’ll ever experience will probably remain Jaws, since I saw it when I was twelve. This looks competently made (based on the red band trailer), but splatterpunk movies and comics have removed most of the visceral impact of gore for me. 

  • [penguinchris]

    I watched the original Evil Dead films when I was in high school (ten or so years ago), when I was also watching outrageously gory Japanese films (among others) and playing violent video games and everything. I wasn’t really into gore or anything, it just went along with the territory.

    I watched the first Evil Dead again earlier this year and was shocked at the gore. It’s a lot more effective than most more recent attempts (not that I’ve seen any of the American torture porn films of the past decade, Saw etc.) and while it didn’t make me squirm in the same way as Audition or Ichi the Killer, my eyes were wide open at the gory bits.

    The trailer for this new one looks, frankly, ridiculous… part of what made the original so effective is the simplicity and they seem to have gone way overboard here – what really cemented that for me was the girl cutting her tongue with the utility knife at the end, completely unnecessary (while the girl cutting her own possessed arm off earlier in the trailer was also over the top, but effective and makes sense).