“In the concrete veins of a dying city, the dead find new ways to rise.”
Evil Dead Rise Revisited
Thirteen years after the last theatrical outing for Sam Raimi’s unstoppable franchise, Evil Dead Rise arrived in 2023 with a promise to drag the Deadite plague out of the woods and into the fluorescent-lit corridors of a decaying Los Angeles apartment block. Lee Cronin’s film does more than simply relocate the carnage; it re-engineers the series’ DNA while preserving the raw, gleeful cruelty that has always defined the saga. Revisiting the picture now, with the benefit of distance and repeated viewings, reveals a work that is both respectful homage and vicious reinvention.
Concrete Tombs and Rising Dread
The decision to trap the action inside the claustrophobic towers of the Los Angeles Crest Apartments immediately alters the franchise’s usual geography of fear. Where earlier entries exploited the isolation of remote cabins, Cronin weaponises the vertical anonymity of high-rise living. Thin walls, shared ventilation shafts and a single unreliable lift become instruments of terror. The opening sequence, set against the humming backdrop of a parking garage at night, establishes the tone with clinical efficiency: a mother possessed, children endangered, and the Necronomicon already whispering its promises of resurrection.
Sound Design as Weapon
One of the film’s most impressive achievements lies in its layered soundscape. The groaning of ancient pipes merges with the wet, organic noises of possession until the building itself feels alive and hostile. When the possessed Ellie first speaks in the voice of her children’s father, the audio design refuses to clarify whether the voice emanates from her or from the walls around her. This sonic ambiguity heightens the paranoia that runs through every corridor and stairwell.
Director in the Spotlight
Lee Cronin was born in 1973 in Ireland and began making short films in his early twenties while working as a graphic designer. His debut feature, The Hole in the Ground (2019), demonstrated a talent for slow-building familial dread set against rural Irish landscapes. When Raimi and producer Rob Tapert sought a new voice to steer the next chapter of the Evil Dead saga, Cronin’s ability to blend domestic unease with supernatural violence made him the natural choice.
Cronin has cited Mario Bava’s colour-saturated gothic horrors and David Cronenberg’s body-centric nightmares as formative influences. These elements surface in Evil Dead Rise through the film’s sickly green and bruised-purple lighting palette and its unflinching focus on the physical corruption of the human form. The director’s filmography remains compact yet distinctive:
- The Devil’s Doorway (short, 2007)
- The Hole in the Ground (2019)
- Evil Dead Rise (2023)
Future projects announced include an original science-fiction horror currently in development, suggesting Cronin intends to continue exploring confined spaces under supernatural siege.
Actor in the Spotlight
Alyssa Sutherland brings a terrifying duality to Ellie, the single mother whose body becomes the primary battleground for the Deadite invasion. Born in Australia in 1982, Sutherland began her career as a fashion model before transitioning to acting with roles in television series such as Vikings and The Mist. Her performance in Evil Dead Rise marks her most physically demanding screen work to date.
Sutherland’s filmography includes:
- Daybreakers (2009)
- The Mist (2017, series)
- Evil Dead Rise (2023)
- The Walking Dead: Dead City (2023–present)
Her ability to shift from exhausted maternal warmth to gleeful, predatory malice within a single unbroken take supplies the film’s emotional core. The scene in which Ellie, suspended from the ceiling by cables, calmly threatens her children while blood pools beneath her remains one of the most unsettling maternal inversions in recent horror cinema.
Legacy and Influence
Since its release, Evil Dead Rise has prompted renewed discussion about the viability of confined-space horror in an era of expansive streaming budgets. Its modest $19 million production cost and strong box-office performance demonstrated that audiences still respond to practical effects and contained narratives when executed with conviction. The film’s influence can already be seen in several recent elevated-horror projects that similarly weaponise architectural spaces.
Revisiting the picture confirms that Cronin achieved something rare: he honoured the franchise’s legacy of inventive gore while carving out a distinct identity. The concrete towers of the Crest Apartments now sit alongside the original cabin in the collective memory of horror fans, proof that evil can rise anywhere when the right book is opened.
Bibliography
Cronin, L. (2023) Audio commentary for Evil Dead Rise. Los Angeles: Warner Bros. Home Entertainment.
McGreevy, N. (2023) ‘Lee Cronin on bringing the Evil Dead home’, Irish Times, 21 April.
Newman, K. (2023) ‘Evil Dead Rise review’, Empire, May issue, pp. 92–93.
Raimi, S. (2023) ‘Foreword’, in Evil Dead Rise: The Official Screenplay. London: Titan Books.
Tapert, R. (2023) Interviewed by Variety, 18 April.
Travers, P. (2023) ‘Evil Dead Rise’, Rolling Stone, 21 April.
Warner Bros. (2023) Evil Dead Rise Production Notes. Burbank: Warner Bros. Pictures.
Williams, L. (2024) ‘Vertical horror and the apartment gothic’, Journal of Horror Studies, 12(1), pp. 45–61.
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