Highly inventive U.S. film director/producer/writer/actor Sam Raimi
first came to the attention of film fans with the savage, yet darkly
humorous, low-budget horror film,
Tanz der Teufel (1981). From his
childhood, Raimi was a fan of the cinema and, before he was
ten-years-old, he was out making movies with an 8mm camera. He was a
devoted fan of The Three Stooges, so
much of Raimi's film work in his teens, with good friends
Bruce Campbell and
Rob Tapert, was slapstick comedy
based around what they had observed from "Stooges" movies.
Among the three of them, they wrote, directed, produced and edited a
short horror movie titled
Within the Woods (1978), which
was then shown to prospective investors to raise the money necessary to
film Tanz der Teufel (1981). It met
with lukewarm interest in the U.S. with local distributors, so Raimi
took the film to Europe, where it was much more warmly received. After
it started gaining positive reviews and, more importantly, ticket sales
upon its release in Europe, U.S. distributors showed renewed interest,
and "Evil Dead" was eventually released stateside to strong box office
returns. His next directorial effort was
Die Killer-Akademie (1985), a quirky,
cartoon-like effort that failed to catch fire with audiences. However,
he bounced back with
Tanz der Teufel 2 - Jetzt wird noch mehr getanzt (1987), a racier and
more humorous remake/sequel to the original "Dead" that did even better
at the box office. Raimi was then given his biggest budget to date to
shoot Darkman (1990), a comic book-style
fantasy about a scarred avenger. The film did moderate business, but
Raimi's strong visual style was evident throughout the film via
inventive and startling camera work that caught the attention of
numerous critics.
The third chapter in the Evil Dead story beckoned, and Raimi once again
directed buddy Campbell as the gritty hero "Ash", in the Gothic horror
Armee der Finsternis (1992). Raimi
surprised fans when he took a turn away from the fantasy genre and
directed Gene Hackman and
Sharon Stone in the sexy western,
Schneller als der Tod (1995);
four years later, he took the directorial reins on
Ein einfacher Plan (1998), a crime
thriller about stolen money, starring
Bill Paxton and
Bridget Fonda. In early 1999, he directed
the baseball film,
Aus Liebe zum Spiel (1999),
and, in 2000, returned to the fantasy genre with a top-flight cast in
The Gift - Die dunkle Gabe (2000). In 2002, Raimi was
given a real opportunity to demonstrate his dynamic visual style with
the big-budget film adaptation of the
Stan Lee comic book superhero,
Spider-Man (2002), and fans were not
disappointed. The movie was strong in both script and effects, and was
a runaway success at the box office. Of course, Raimi returned for the
sequel, Spider-Man 2 (2004), which
surpassed the original in box-office takings.
