Download MP3 In today's episode Nate and Austin compare Sam Raimi' best and worst rated films, Evil Dead 2 (1987) and Spider-Man 3 (2007), respectively. Nate goes on about horror films again, Austin has a nostalgia trip, and they both go off on tangents. Check back next Sunday at 7pm PST where we will compare Rian Johnson's Star Wars: The Last Jedi (2017) and The Brothers Bloom (2008), his best and worst rated films. Also check out this interview with director Sam Raimi about his lowest rated film, Spider-Man 3: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cnzoLtP8scQ

Spider-Man 3 Notes

Worst Rated

PLOT: A strange black entity from another world bonds with Peter Parker and causes inner turmoil as he contends with new villains, temptations, and revenge.

• Ratings: IMDb 6.2 | RT 63% C / 51% A
• Released: 2007
• Director: Sam Raimi
• Writer(s): Sam Raimi & Ivan Raimi and Alvin Sargent (screenplay), Saim Raimi & Ivan Raimi (screen story), Stan Lee and Steve Ditko (Marvel comic book)
• Cinematographer: Bill Pope (The Matrix, The Jungle Book, Bound)
• Notable actors: Tobey Maguire, Kirsten Dunst, James Franco, Thomas Haden Church, Topher Grace, Bryce Dallas Howard, Rosemary Harris, J.K. Simmons, James Cromwell, Theresa Russell, Dylan Baker, Bill Nunn, Bruce Campbell, Elizabeth Banks, Ted Raimi, Perla Haney-Jardine, Willem Dafoe, Cliff Robertson
• Budget: $258 million
• Box office: $890.9 million

• Fun Facts:
  • On May 4th, 2007, while promoting the film on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno (1992), Thomas Haden Church revealed that he broke three knuckles during the subway scene where he swings to punch Spider-Man and ends up punching a chunk of the wall away. Church said that the effects crew had told him that the brick in the middle was fake while the upper and lower ones were real. Unfortunately, the foam brick had not actually been put in place yet, and when Sam Raimi yelled 'action', Church spun around and punched the real brick on the first take.
  • All of the screams Kirsten Dunst had for this film were recycled from Spider-Man 2 (2004).
  • Bryce Dallas Howard performed her own stunts during the crane accident scene, unaware that she was pregnant at the time of filming.
  • In total, the film took 2 years and 10 months to make.
  • There were many scenes that were shot but never released on DVD including a montage of Peter (in his black suit) taking down criminals and leaving them strung up, tons of character-building moments, a confrontation scene between Captain Stacy and Eddie Brock (where Gwen dumps him at her father's house) and Peter freaking out after he looks in a mirror and sees a nightmarish version of the Venom symbiote screaming at him.
  • It was considered at one point to split the movie into two films.
  • One of the sounds used for Venom is of a Tasmanian Devil.
  • According to James Franco, they had to go back and do some re-shoots just prior to the release, because test audiences felt that there was not enough action in the film.

Evil Dead 2 Notes

Best Rated

PLOT: The lone survivor of an onslaught of flesh-possessing spirits holes up in a cabin with a group of strangers while the demons continue their attack.

• Ratings: IMDb 7.8 | RT 98% C / 89% A
• Released: 1987
• Director: Sam Raimi
• Writer(s): Sam Raimi & Scott Spiegel (written by)
• Cinematographer: Peter Deming (Twin Peaks, Oz the Great and Powerful, Mulholland Drive)
• Notable actors: Bruce Campbell, Sarah Berry, Dan Hicks, Kassie Wesley DePaiva, Ted Raimi, Denise Bixler
• Budget: $3.6 million
• Box office: $5.9 million

• Fun Facts:
  • During the scene where the severed head of Linda bites Ash's hand, Bruce Campbell says the single line "work shed". This line was later re-dubbed in post-production due to the quality of the audio, giving it a strange, slightly "disproportionate" sound to the audio. Nine years later, while filming his cameo in Escape from L.A. (1996), the first thing Kurt Russell said to Bruce Campbell on the set was, jokingly, "Say 'work shed'".
  • Stephen King was such a huge fan of The Evil Dead (1981) that he convinced producer Dino De Laurentiis over dinner (who was producing King's Maximum Overdrive (1986) at the time) to have his production company DEG (De Laurentiis Entertainment Group) finance Evil Dead II.
  • Often considered to be a remake of The Evil Dead (1981); however, this is not accurate. The rights to show scenes from the original could not be obtained to re-cap what happened, so the beginning was remade to explain how Ash got to the cabin, etc.
  • The recap of The Evil Dead (1981) includes a shot where the "evil force" runs through the cabin and rams into Ash. When this shot was filmed, Bruce Campbell suffered a broken jaw when Sam Raimi (who was operating the camera) crashed into him with a bicycle - or so people were led to believe. This was a story concocted by Sam Raimi and Bruce Campbell as a gag to see how many people would believe it actually happened.
  • Most of the film was shot on a set built inside the gymnasium of the JR Faison Junior High School in Wadesboro, North Carolina.
  • Ash's chainsaw appears to switch hands in one scene. This is because Sam Raimi decided Ash should walk the opposite way across the room in that scene, so he flipped the negative.

Intro music by Eric Lynch