Although I feel no Possession film can do it better than The Exorcist, the possessed films keep coming, and these days are practically a genre onto themselves.
This also happened briefly back in the ’70’s when there were tons of low-budget knockoffs of The Exorcist and The Omen, which made evil kids popular at the movies, but the trend didn’t last long.
Still, everything old is new again, especially at the movies, and I was surprised to see that Possession, produced by Raimi, has gotten decent reviews, (the L.A. Times wrote its “scares are better than most”), and this one has a Jewish spin which makes it different right there. Instead of calling a Catholic priest, this family calls in a Hasidic rabbi to drive a demon out of their daughter.
Like a lot of horror films claim, Possession is allegedly based on a true story. Raimi told Collider, The Possession came from an L.A. Times story called “Jinx in a Box,” where people came in contact with a Dibbuk box, a wine cabinet that according to Jewish folklore is haunted by a spirit, and it supposedly caused all kinds of terrible things to happen. Could this be a Yiddish version of The Evil Dead? “I’m not a believer just in anything,” Raimi said. “But something about it seemed like it could be true.”
And as we’ve recently reported here on TG Daily, both Raimi and Bruce Campbell have had high praise of the Evil Dead remake, which is coming on April 12, 2013. As Campbell told Collider, it features all new characters being tormented in the woods, because why remake the first one shot for shot? Campbell also acknowledged it’s going to be tough to get the old school Dead fans on their side, but he said, “I think it’s definitely fabulous…We’re really excited and really behind it.”
Raimi also promised the nu model Dead won’t wuss out on the gore, and this one will definitely be R rated, “maybe worse. I’ve seen almost all the dailies and they’re really going for it. It’s going to be grisly and intense and non-stop.”
Raimi’s also producing a remake of Poltergeist, which celebrated its 30th anniversary this year. While I haven’t seen the first one in a while and have no idea whether it holds up or not, it certainly scared the hell out of a lot of people thirty years ago, and I’d be curious to see what Raimi could do with it. He told Collider he’s expecting a draft of the script in October, so we’ll see how swiftly that one makes it to the screen.
