ARMY OF DARKNESS
A film review by Ahn@suncis.ycc.yale.edu
Copyright 1993 Ahn@suncis.ycc.yale.edu
ARMY OF DARKNESS Directed by Sam Raimi Starring Bruce Campbell
General Comment: If you have a life (i.e., you're not making a fortune by sticking coal up your butt), you'll enjoy this movie.
Sam Raimi has an intense visual style which I would characterize as the Coen brothers locked in puberty. And I don't mean that in a bad way (by the way, the two directors are acquaintances and have a film--I forget the name--in which all three were involved. Sam Raimi also appears in Coen Brothers' MILLER'S CROSSING, briefly.) One of Raimi's proclaimed influences are the Three Stooges. Curiously enough, it is specifically that influence which pops up in ARMY OF DARKNESS as often as the number of times undead pop out of the ground.
It's a tough task that Raimi tackles in making a sequel to the tightly crafted EVIL DEAD II: DEAD BY DAWN (essentially a remake of EVIL DEAD, or as Raimi claims, a remake of EVIL DEAD as a *tribute to the Three Stooges*. Go figure.) It's one thing to have mundane machoman Ash (Bruce Campbell) surviving in an isolated house in the woods chopping evil dead limbs, spouting one-liners to the already dead like "You're going down" but it's a much more monumental challenge to propel Ash into a movie of epic form, epic in the tradition of KING ARTHUR AND THE ROUND TABLE and D&D-like fantasy novels.
We have seen plenty of fantasy movies from Hollywood, and to be quite frank, they all sucked (THE DARK CRYSTAL being a remarkable exception, sci-fi not being included in the genre I call fantasy, and THE PRINCESS BRIDE not really fantasy). The pretense of making a "real" fantasy just becomes too inflated on the big screen. All the costumes and makeup don't come even close to the images we've already formed in our heads. No one's been able to touch that dreamworld who's foundation lies in the logos of reading books and playing D&D games. And wisely enough, considering the character of Ash, Raimi avoids even trying.
Instead, Raimi sticks to his guns. Army of Darkness is slapstick and parody (a parody of King Arthur and other mythological legends) backed up by solid effects and amazing camerawork.
Just as a note, there are some scenes in which Raimi's cameraman had epileptic seizures, and though they were intentional, it was a bit distracting (I kept thinking through the fast camera work, "Don't tell the story in pans ... tell the story in cuts, Sam. No, Sam, schizoid, fast blurry pans are not an exception to the rule."). And as if he heard me, Raimi's next scene involves a hilarious rapid-fire sequence of cuts in which Ash dresses in knight gear. Bravo!
The comedy potential for situating Ash into a mythological role as The Prophesized One is realized by Raimi, but only halfway. There are great scenes. As Ash begins to gain respect from the medieval people, he yells with authority, waving his gun in the air, "This ... is my BOOM STICK." The scene in which Ash finds the NECRONOMICON is also unforgettable (and elicited the most noise from the audience as Ash mutters "I know it starts with an 'n'...") However, it seems to me that Raimi didn't study his fantasy films, because in the end he resorts to Three Stooges (Ouch ouch! Take this! Oof! Stop it, stop it! Nyuknyuk!--you know the kind) type humor to keep his movie going. While that base level of humor had its moments, overdoing it seemed to drain the menace out of the Army of Darkness and hence the climax never got off to a jump start. There's the cliche technology vs. brute force theme and that's about it.
It is my opinion that Raimi should have limited his humor to the interplay between Ash (90s man) and the medieval myth-seeking folk and the machoesque manner in which Ash disposes of The Dead (great scene in which Ash flexes after shooting a witch from behind his back). However, he focused that Three Stooginizations upon The Dead also, a mistake he didn't make in EVIL DEAD II. The leader of The Army of Darkness appeared stupid, harmless and for a while I thought he was a metaphor for Curly. Who knows.
But there's something to be said for the almost Ren & Stimpy-esque manner in which Raimi has his characters trying to prove their manliness and survive at the same time. There's something to be said for the times in which indignity stares both Ash and the viewer right in the face whether it be in the form of skeletal fingers or just forgetfulness. And I would never dismiss Raimi's talent as prepubescent or wasted. After all, I enjoyed the movie.
-- Mos Eisley ahn@pop.cis.yale.edu
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