Tuesday, June 02, 2009

DRAG ME TO HELL NOW AVAILABLE

Here is the summary for the movie Drag Me To Hell from imdb

A loan officer ordered to evict an old woman from her home finds herself the recipient of a supernatural curse, which turns her life into a living hell. Desperate, she turns to a seer to try and save her soul, while evil forces work to push her to a breaking point.

Here is a review for the movie Drag Me to Hell from dvdtalk

Drag Me to Hell is the kind of movie that would have brought a smile to the face of horror showman William Castle, who was known for sticking buzzers in seats and dangling plastic skeletons on wires to get a giggle-worthy reaction out of audience members. Lots of movies are described as rollercoaster rides for the audience, and Castle might have suggested someone hook co-writer/director Sam Raimi's return to horror up to an actual rollercoaster, so the audience could get flung around like poor heroine Christine Brown (Alison Lohman) as they watched her desperately try to escape a curse placed on her by an incensed gypsy woman (Lorna Raver). Sadly, Castle can't, but it isn't necessary: this movie is a ride already.

So what makes Raimi's film work while other teen slasher films fall flat? Two factors stand out: Raimi's respect for his audience, and his desire to make being terrified fun again. He and his co-writer brother Ivan (the writing team that gave us Darkman, and, of course, Army of Darkness) know that people go to horror movies expecting to jump out of their seats, and it's twice as entertaining if the director lets them in on the joke, because most genre fans are anyway. When Christine looks out the window at a horrendous creaking sound, Raimi cuts closer on her face in rapid succession because he wants the viewer to get up on their toes and grab their dates in advance, and when the scare arrives, it's almost cathartic in its amusement. Raimi described the style as "spook-a-blast", which encapsulates his technique perfectly: if you're not laughing after every scream in Drag Me to Hell, then you're only getting half the experience.

Anyone worried by the movie's trailer and big studio backing -- and worse, the dreaded PG-13 rating -- that Raimi isn't going to go all the way with this one can also put their fears to rest. The first thing you'll notice is the sound; Drag Me to Hell is one of the loudest movies I can remember seeing. Weird compliment, I know, but it's almost a classic Raimi gag: I laughed because it's like he wants the viewer to experience Christine's physical torment through the abusive soundtrack (and every Raimi fan know how much the man loves to abuse). Also, while I don't agree with the common opinion that this is Evil Dead 4 with a different wrapper, it's hard not to feel like you've been transported back to 1992 when a possessed lackey, decked out in signature KNB makeup, dances comically in the air above a flaming table, or when any number of gross-out fluids spew on the movie's hapless characters. Raimi even slaps the 80's Universal logo on the movie, and an even older logo at the end of the credits. It's wonderfully nostalgic.

Drag was originally meant to star Ellen Page of Juno fame, but her trademark cynical demeanor would have derailed Raimi's intentions. Lohman plays Christine with more naïvete than Page could have mustered (or, perhaps, has ever mustered), and it's key to the character's development. Much like Bruce Campbell's Ash, Christine just doesn't understand how she's implicitly responsible for her horrid fate at the hands of the lamia, and her relative cluelessness actually drives the plot forward. You also wouldn't have been able to buy Page liking a dork like Christine's boyfriend Clay Dalton (Justin Long), who's a different type of naïve, believing that Christine's accursed affliction can be chalked up to post-traumatic stress disorder. So often in movies, the skeptic is meant to be relatable to the audience, an icon of our own disbelief, but Raimi plays Clay's dismissal like a joke we're in on...one with a darkly amusing punchline.

As for everything else, the movie breezes by at a cool 99 minutes: it takes three days for the lamia to take you away, so Christine's time to figure out a solution is in short supply. Help comes in the form of Rham Jas (Dileep Rao), whose potential con-man status is amusingly unresolved by both the script and Rao's quiet performance. He suggests a séance, which results in one of the film's best armrest-gripping sequences. The film's only flaws are more than a fair share of sub-par CGI, and a fairly predictable resolution, but both elements are sold with enough enthusiasm to keep the audience on board through the rough patches.

It's the middle of summer, and I don't know if people are looking to be frightened, but I hope so, because Drag Me to Hell delivers. I don't know if I've seen a more successful horror movie in theaters, and it's great to get Raimi back, even if it's just for one picture. I criticized the trailer before, but it's right about one thing: this is a return to true horror, delivered with impish glee by one of the genre's modern maestros. As Christine is repeatedly besieged by floating corpse as she tries to crawl out of a flooding graveyard plot, I couldn't help but wonder if Sam himself was under the water, insistently jabbing the prop at his lead actress, trying to get a rise out of her, and by extension, the audience. It's Raimi's version of the seat buzzer, and somewhere, William Castle is laughing out loud. Boo!


Here is the direct download for the movie Drag Me To Hell.

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