Evil Dead Rise director Lee Cronin says families are a horror movie

As the first Evil Dead movie in 10 years, Evil Dead Rise has no problem reinventing Sam Raimi’s iconic gonzo horror franchise. Lee Cronin’s new standalone take on the storied franchise is a smart, snappy mix of the over-the-top mayhem of the original films and the brutal horror of the 2013 remake, but it’s also a personal film for the Irish horror author.

Forward Evil Dead Rise‘s premiere, Cronin spoke to Polygon about the inspirations for his radically different but supremely faithful take on Raimi’s Evil Dead movies, and his own very healthy relationship with his family – which inspired him to create some really messed up fictional families .

Polygon: You’re only the third person to make an official Evil Dead movie. What is Evil Dead to you?

Le Cronin:Evil Dead is part of my childhood, and part of my culture and understanding of horror movies, from when I was very young and really started to enjoy the genre. But Evil Dead is also a kind of pure, unfiltered energy through both the gruesome aspects and the terror, as well as the pure, thrilling cinematicity of it all. It’s something that brings this really exciting independent streak that always motivated me when I was younger. Like it, Hey, I can make movies too. So it’s also been a bit of a guide for me in terms of how to make a movie and how to stay motivated to go ahead and make something happen.

There are many parallels between them Evil Dead Rise and your debut The hole in the ground. You’ve talked in the past about how you’re drawn to family storytelling – why do you think it is, and what makes Evil Dead good for that?

I think it’s the ultimate universal theme. Recently, [I thought] about the things I’m working on, and they all lean back to some version of family, like you’re clinging to that thing. And I was terrified, go, Oh my god, can I tell a story about something other than family?!

But actually I think all the stories come back to family in a way. Even if it is a war story, and it is about a group of brothers together. It’s that camaraderie, there’s a sense of family there. And so you watch a mafia movie, it’s about family, whatever it may be. So I think what I’m specifically drawn to is it’s in my head, it’s what I call the family wound, and everyone has one. There is no perfect family, there is no perfect size for a family.

So it’s a very, very interesting place as a horror filmmaker and as a storyteller who likes suspense, fear and atmosphere to put your fingers in that space and look around.

So this appeals to you as a storyteller, not just a horror filmmaker?

I’m sort of a child of Amblin and that world, and I’m a big, big fan of Spielberg. When you look at those movies, it’s often families parallel and families at crossroads. You look at ETyou’re looking at Chief Brody [in Jaws], who takes to the water to protect his family. So I think it’s the things that influenced me. And then my experiences growing up the family, and the observation of the highs and lows, the ups, the downs, the breaks, the wins – all that stuff is just a very, very fertile place.

You also focused on motherhood in both films – what makes that dynamic so powerful for you?

I am very close to my mother and to my sister who is next in age. My sister is a mother of three children. I kind of made this little family unit on her family Evil Dead Rise. When I was 10 years old, every other person in my family was an adult at that time. So my sister was 18. And then my brothers were older, and then my parents, so I had to find my voice very, very young.

But also, being at a young age and then seeing the strength and power of the female mother figures in my family that I was very, very close to – it’s just a theme that I’m really into, because it’s a beautiful thing. But it also brings very specific challenges as a mother. It just seems like a place that’s interesting to analyze and tell stories about, in a really universal thematic way.

This comes out Evil Dead Risewhere much of the fear comes from moments where characters don’t recognize a family member, or characters expressing extremely negative thoughts about their loved ones.

Yes, it’s pretty dark. I am very close to my extended family and enjoy spending time with them. We are good friends. I think that gives me the confidence to start messing with the structure of the family and put it in a very, very dark place.

I think there’s something really powerful about losing identity with someone very, very close to you, and struggling to hold on to that identity. It’s why in it Evil Dead Rise, there’s that scene in the middle of the movie where little Cassie talks to her mom through the peephole. While there’s some humor in it and it’s played that way, it’s also kind of awful, because she’s a 9-year-old kid completely confused by what she’s going through at the time.

Image: Warner Bros.

I think one of the most terrifying things in the world is the first moment you see someone in your life in a different light than you’ve never seen before. So let’s say you’re in a new relationship, you’ve been dating for a year, everything is great, you’re having your first fight, and you’re hearing that person’s voice in a way you’ve never heard before. Or you see a look in their eyes that you’ve never seen before, and you go Oh my god I don’t recognize this person. And that’s really terrifying to me in the first place.

You often include children in your horror. Do you think children are naturally scary?

Scary little bastards? Yes. [Laughs]

See, it’s twofold for me. It’s the movies I saw when I was younger – very often family and children are in danger. I looked at things like ETI watched the TV movie of IT for example, I looked at The Goonies — those kinds of movies were the kind of stuff I used to watch a lot. And in turn, I am not a parent, but I have three brothers and sisters. Between all of them I have nine cousins. So I also interact a lot with young people in my life.

They’re very interesting eyes in terrifying worlds, whether they’re the object of terror or the person who’s terrified – it’s a recurring theme, I think, or a recurring type of character. I think it just comes from influence and observation.

Evil Dead Rise now playing in theaters.