Army of Darkness: Special Edition

Rating:
Summary: Blood, Guts and Comedy
Review: Army of Darkness is the third (and so far final) movie in the Evil Dead Series. Before director Sam Raimi went legits with a series of critically acclaimed dramas and the Spiderman series, he was a low budget horror genius. Army of Darkness begins right where Evil Dead II ended, with Bruce Campbell trapped in medieval times to battle the deadites once again.

The trilogy started out in Evil Dead as a pretty straight horror movie. A group of people discover a book of the dead and unleash gore filled horror upon themselves in a remote cabin. Evil Dead II basically re-tells the same story with a different cast (except for the ever present Bruce Campbell), bigger budget and plenty of slapstick. The second movie is by far my favorite in the series. It keeps the ghoulish gore while adding hilarious physical comedy and some classic one liners. Army of Darkness furthers this tradition by adding even more slap stick and one lines while removing almost all of the gore.

What little plot there is goes something like this: Stranded in the middle ages Bruce Campbell is at first captured by a small army for being mistaken for a member of a rival army. Bruce quickly uses his "boomstick" to gain clout with his captors and is sent on a quest to recover the Necronomicon which will both send Bruce back to his own time and save the army from evil. Bruce being Bruce he gets the book and unleashes an army of the dead. There are two endings released for this movie. One happier ending was released in US theatres and another sequel set up unhappy ending seen in a theatrical cut in the UK and on many US DVD versions.

Raimi once again does a nice job creating a mix of horror movie cliche's (which range from Jason and the Argonauts to Gulliver's Travels) with the slapstick of the Three Stooges. Unfortunately the comic elements seem to take over this picture leaving the horror end of it as more of a backdrop. It feels more like a Zucker brother's movie more than a horror film. Most of the evil dead are formed as skeletons which only crumble when destroyed rather than burst into a mess of blood and guts as they did in the first two movies. This may seem to be an absurd complaint, but as a fan of gory movies I felt disappointed with that choice.

The cinematography is actually quite well done throughout most of the picture. My DVD copy is actually quite beautiful in scenes. Especially the exterior shots around the windmill. The use of color and lighting is well above par for most horror films. The pre CGI special effects effect the quality of the print in several areas, but still hold up as goofy Raimi effects. I kept thinking the picture was too pretty for what was actually taking place on screen.
Bruce Campbell once again does a nice job of making Ash come to life. He delivers his lines with the comic timing of a comedian while still delivering enough pain to make his albeit over-the-top beatings believable. The rest of the cast is hardly memorable as characters or for their acting.

Army of Darkness still makes a nice end to the trilogy. In a way it makes a nice bookend to Evil Dead's pure gore horror with the single middle book being a mix between bloody gore and slapstick comedy.

Rating:
Summary: Amusing Comic Horror Swashbuckler
Review: Your enjoyment of "Army of Darkness" is not totally dependent on seeing the "Evil Dead" films first but it does help. This film takes something of a departure from the first films in attempting to mainstream the series. It is more humorous and it is virtually bloodless. It is also interesting that director Sam Raimi took the series into a time-travel vein. The action scenes and special effects are terrific. This film is played for macabre humor as opposed to outright horror. Star Bruce Campbell just continues to amaze as the series progresses. He had already proven himself as a comic force in "Evil Dead II" and here he expands himself as an action star something akin to an Errol Flynn or a Harrison Ford. If you want to wean the squeamish on the series start with this film and go backward.

Rating:
Summary: One star for Double Dipping beyond reason!
Review: Before you read this review, of course I give this movie five stars. I am putting down one star here for a reason. Fox and Miramax are notorious for the double dipping. They release a movie, and then four months to a year later, they release a "special edition" with extra bells and whistles, leaving hard core film fans having to spend additional funds on the film they love.

When it comes to the double dip, Anchor Bay puts them to shame. For instance, there is their five different releases of the original "Dawn of the Dead", and three releases of "Day of the Dead".

With "Army of Darkness," first they had a theatrical version of the film released on DVD. Next, they came out with a "limited edition" release of "Army of Darkness" packaged with both the theatrical version and the Director's Cut. Third, they release the "Army of Darkness" DVD with a new cover, not bothering to put on the case which version of the film was contained within. Fourth, they release the "all new 'Army of Darkness: Special Edition' with new commentary," which turned out to be the exact same as the "limited edition" version. Fifth, we got the "Army of Darkness: Director's Cut" boasting new scenes, when, in fact, it was the exact same as theDirector's Cuts in the previous releases. Sixth, we got the "Bruce Campbell vs. The Army of Darkness (The Official Bootleg Edition)", which was the exact same as the previous four director's cut releases.

Now, we get the Seventh release, the "Army of Darkness (Boomstick Edition)" which is no different from any of the other editions. I think somewhere along the way, they added THX sound to the DVD, but for the life of me I can't tell you which version that was. The sad thing is, I (almost) enjoy the regular version of this film a little better. In the extended version some of the cuts are worse, the final battle goes on a little too long, dialogue is changed, and all of the aditional scenes are on bad film and look horribly out of place. Still, the new ending and the windmill sequince are still far better scenes in the "director's cut." Then again, I really do enjoy the ending in the theatrical version, just because we get to see Ted Raimi working in S-mart.

Rating:
Summary: this is my boom stick!!!
Review: The undisputed king of corny horror goes to sam raimis horribly brilliant flick. While evild dead (1, and 2) seem almost like the tone is saposed to be horror( but really is just funny) aod is geared more or less to a more spoofish kind of schlock film that lets the bruce cambell i have come to love make his appearnce. His script in itself could create a brand new die hard movie its got so many bad one-liners. The special affects are not too special and the plot isn't exactly oscar award winning stuff. So whats so great about it? IT'S F***#@ING HILLARIOUS. The true definition of a cult classic
..this movie has stood the test of time
..very very low budget
...and yet it doesnt matter because its brilliant in its own way. go ahead and check it out if you havent already.

Rating:
Summary: THIS MOVIE RULES!
Review: Army of Darkness is one of the best horror-comedy movies ever made. Bruce Campell is very funny in this movie and delivers some of the most memorable one-liners ever said.(Play Duke Nukem on the PC and you'll hear Bruce Campell's lines from this movie in the game.) The third movie in the trilogy is far better film then the first two B-movies combined. The story is well written and paced very well. The acting is spotty but the main characters do the job nicely. I loved this movie and would recommend it to any one who loves an off the wall adventure. Get it on DVD.

Rating:
Summary: Buy the original, this sucks. Hail to the Editors Baby!
Review: I bought this in the hope that I'd see more Bruce Campbell wise cracks. What you get is the theatrical feature with ungraded cuttings from the editing room floor glued in with chewing gum and paperclips. The original film is one of my all time favorites and this version proves that editors do a very good job by removing anything that is unneccesary, misleading or of poor film-making quality. This DVD is basically everything that is great about Army of Darkness with added unneccesary, misleading and poor quality footage.

Hail to the Editors baby!

Rating:
Summary: Compare This To Dawn of The Dead
Review: This movie is a great flick to watch when you're in need of an old-looking thriller. It wasn't that scary, but the effects were pretty good for the early nineties. This is a great movie for all audiences, and Sam Raimi, who directed this film and an Acclaimed Director, also has other movies that blew me away:

Spider-Man 2: Director
Spider-Man: Director
The Grudge: Producer
Army of Darkness: Director

all of the above are great Friday-Night-Flicks.

Rating:
Summary: Brilliantly Stupid
Review: What do you get when you put Bruce Cambell, zombies, horror, comedy, romance (kind of), sci-fi (time travel), a shoelace budget, and excessive "badass" lines together? That's right, you get "Army of Darkness". The Evil Dead trilogy has a unique personality. Understanding it is the key to enjoying this movie.

Rating:
Summary: Boomstick Edition
Review: Army of Darkness includes the original theatrical release and the director's cut on two seperate discs. The theatrical disc includes a documentary on the making of the special effects, while the directors cut has some deleted scenes and commentary with Sam Raimi and Bruce Campbell.

No complaints about the theatrical release. Classic Army of Darkness.

The Director's cut disc has problems though. Almost every time it cuts to scenes not in the theatrical cut, the picture gets muddy. The deleted scenes are also very muddy. Strange, considering some of these scenes are actually shown in fairly crisp form when the movie is shown on TV. There's really no reason for this disc to get as muddy as it does. The commentary, though, is great.

If you're just looking to own a copy of Army of Darkness, save a few bucks and just get the theatrical release. If you REALLY like the movie, and want to know whats in the director's cut, then get this, since it isn't TOO much more than the normal theatrical release.


I was expecting a lot more extras than there were, too. Oh well. I got the movie, that's what counts.