Groovy

I finally got my paws on the super-poncy Ultimate Edition DVD of the 1981 horror classic The Evil Dead. I've always liked this movie, but when I saw the fancy, pinky-out 3-disc awesomeness, I knew it had to be mine. Now, for the longest time, I was terrified of horror movies in any capacity. Even bad ones. I have an extremely overactive imagination, which sometimes makes it difficult for me to watch movies and just look at them as a work of fiction. However, I better enjoy this while I can; I've heard from a number of sources that film school destroys your capacity to enjoy movies (I've already gotten a small taste of it; after completing segmentations and writing an in-depth analysis of Psycho, I've had absolutely no desire to watch it again in the past year). But back to my original point: The Evil Dead kicks ass.

Number one, it's got Bruce Campbell in it. I'm pretty sure that "Bruce Campbell" and "ass-kickery" are synonyms. However, good old Bruce isn't exactly sweating testosterone in the first Evil Dead (it increases exponentially in Evil Dead II and Army of Darkness), but he's still awesome.

But the second and more important point is that it is so innovative. I feel like I can count this on the list of movies that make me want to pursue a Film Studies degree. It's not even one of my all-time favorites or anything, but I love watching it so much. Sam Raimi and his friends basically pulled this movie out of their asses, and it has some of the coolest and innovative camera techniques I've ever seen. The movie looks cheap as hell, but that's part of its low budget, campy charm. I can't honestly say if I've ever be good at making my own films (I haven't really had a go at it yet), but I'd like to think back on this film and remember to be clever and innovative. I'm not exactly sure how it works completely, but I think I get the gist of the graduate film studies program: I can get an MFA or and MA. MFA students make their own films, whereas MA students get to bitch about other peoples' films. I bitch about movies all the time anyway, so why not get a degree in it? I just hope that people continue to make awesome movies like this one so I can keep the overall bitching to a minimum.