Wednesday 20 June 2012

Drag Me To Hell

"Drag Me To Hell" (2009, Sam Raimi, Universal Pictures) is a movie about a girl who is cursed by an old lady.

Christine Brown (Alison Lohman) is a bank loan officer. Feeling like she is failing in her career prospects because of her friendly nature, she finally takes out her frustrations on a creepy old woman, Sylvia Ganush (Lorna Raver), who is looking for another extension on her mortgage. Christine tells Mrs Ganush that she cannot give her an extension, and Mrs Ganush begs her to reconsider (like literally, on her knees). Christine has Mrs Ganush thrown off of the premises.

She later runs into Mrs Ganush again who attacks her and tells her she's cursed.

Then the crazy terror begins. In true Raimi style it's nuts and manic! And uh... gross. Brilliantly gross! And hilarious! Like a live action 'Tom and Jerry' cartoon if it had been written by Sam Raimi.

I think Alison Lohman does very well in the, how can I say it? - 'female Ash' role. Which it pretty much is; innocent person put into crazy situation, goes crazy, does crazy things.... it never ends well for them! She goes crazy in an entertaining way. And she's feisty, not the poor-me female lead... but hell does she scream! OK, she's no Bruce Campbell, but I find her performance most enjoyable.

The spirit torments poor Christine through the whole movie. She cannot find forgiveness from Ganush, as she is dead, and she simply appears mad to everyone around her, including her boyfriend Clay (Justin Long). Thankfully, she finds help from a fortune teller, Rham Jas (Dileep Lao), the only person who believes her. Jas convinces her to pay Shaun San Dena (Flor de Maria Chahua), the woman we see at the beginning of the movie who was unable to save a young cursed boy, $10,000 to save her.

There's some séance-ing along with some chanting of "I welcome the dead into my soul!" which reminds me of the deadite's chant in 'Evil Dead 2'; "I'll swallow your soul!"

Really fun, even if it is a bit odd; I mean, crazy old lady or not, surely someone explained what mortgaging your house meant to her?!

Anyway, I'd recommend for some gore, fantasy violence and shock value. And it's very loud!


[Picture: Universal Pictures]

Hani 

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