Movies
Feast III: The Happy Finish (V)
“John Gulager proves once again why he won Project Greenlight as Feast III is almost too good for home video. It’s incredibly stylish, creative and artistic, and carries the stamp of a Gulager movie.”
*Spoiler Warning*
For those of you who were disappointed with Feast II: Sloppy Seconds, it’s time to have your confidence restored as Feast III: The Happy Finish closes out the trilogy on one helluva high note.
The third film once again reunites John Gulager with writers Patrick Melton and Marcus Dunstan, and begins literally where the second ended. The man-eating monsters are still chasing down what’s left of the human survivors (Biker Queen, Bartender, and Lightning to name a few) while random new heroes are introduced to the fold. Hope arrives in the form of a knife-wielding karate kid and a mysterious man who seems to be able to control the beasts, but will their luck be better than our original hero who lasted a mere 30-seconds?
It’s no secret my hatred for the second film, which felt more like a lame cartoon than an homage to classic man-in-rubber-suit monster movies. Many of the film’s flaws also came in the fact that the movie took place during the day and that the final act of the film took place on a greenscreen roof that looked faker than Pamela Anderson’s tits. Knowing that the two sequels were shot back-to-back made me incredibly nervous as I expected the third to be on the same level… I was wrong. While Feast III opens on the rooftop (unfortunately reminding us of that horrible scene), from then on out it’s all blood, guts and entertainment. While Feast II felt nothing like the first film, Feast III somehow managed to recapture the entire aesthetics of the original.
John Gulager proves once again why he won Project Greenlight as Feast III is almost too good for home video. It’s incredibly stylish, creative and artistic, and carries the stamp of a Gulager movie. During one of the climactic battle in the film, Gulager experiments with strobes lights and gives a fresh feel to a familiar tactic. The scene is very reminiscent of something out of an Alien movie, but he also uses a freeze frame technique within the sequence. It’s simply astonishing.
In addition, Gulager takes the film back into the dark and underground. While the idea of shooting a horror film in the daylight is always noble, it rarely works. I for one want to believe these creatures are real, and my putting them in the dark they’re much more convincing and menacing. Even the blood looks 50x better when the sunlight isn’t shining off it.
While the film gets a little exposition heavy at times (and confusing), the Gulgar family carry it through these tough times and back into action. Biker Queen (Diane Goldner) and Bartender (Clu Gulager) are simply awesome and it’s great getting to see them take the spotlight that Gulager fought for in the first film. They prove that he knows a good actor, even if it’s family.
The screenplay is once again fantastic as it’s filled with a bucked of jokes ranging from the hero being named Jean Claude Seagal to a character getting raped from behind by one of the monsters, only to instantly give birth to another creature. Not to mention we get to see Honey Pie (Jenny Wade) decapitated and then enjoy watching one of the monsters eat her head and sh*t it out.
I’m simply confused as how the second film could be so terrible and yet the third is going to be treasured in my collection forever. What a way to end the trilogy, it’s one Happy Finish for us horror fans.
From director Sébastien Vaniček, Evil Dead Burn releases in theaters July 10, but that’s just one of two brand new Evil Dead movies releasing in the next two years.
Evil Dead Wrath recently wrapped production, with the upcoming film from director Francis Galluppi (The Last Stop in Yuma County) set for theatrical release on April 7, 2028.
We’ve known virtually nothing about the movie up to this point, but a recent interview with producer Rob Tapert has surfaced this week (thanks, Dread Central) and it reveals a very surprising bit of information about Evil Dead Wrath. The film is set in 1972!!
Tapert told the students at Michigan State University during a chat, “Evil Dead Wrath is yet another great departure. It predates everything. It takes place in 1972.”
That means Evil Dead Wrath takes place even before the arrival of Ash Williams and friends to that infamous cabin in the woods, which should give the film a whole new kind of flavor.
Sam Raimi’s Army of Darkness was of course set in the Middle Ages, but Evil Dead Wrath will take place chronologically before Ash Williams was transported into medieval times!
“It will feel like a 1972 movie because the director and his DP want to imitate the film’s look and feel of something that’s called Ektachrome 100, which was a film stock,” Tapert notes. “Still available. A lot of movies shot on back then. And so it’s very warm, very tungsten.”
Tapert calls Wrath “very Tarantino-esque, very deliberate. [Galluppi] made a movie, not a horror movie, that I liked a great deal called Last Stop in Yuma County. It’s worth looking up.”
The Last Stop in Yuma County, it’s interesting to note, is also set in the 1970s!
Charlotte Hope (The Nun), Jessica McNamee (Mortal Kombat), Zach Gilford (“Midnight Mass”), Josh Helman (Mad Max: Fury Road), Ella Newton (Dangerous Animals), Elizabeth Cullen (Diabolic), and Ella Oliphant will star in Evil Dead Wrath.
Evil Dead creator Sam Raimi and franchise producer Rob Tapert are producing. Bruce Campbell and Lee Cronin will executive produce alongside Romel Adam and Jose Canas.