'The Evil Dead' Remake Synopsis Sounds A Lot Like 'The Evil Dead'... Up To A Point

We've known since this summer that Fede Alvarez, director of the short Panic Attack, is going to direct a new version of Sam Raimi's breakout film The Evil Dead. Other than that basic report, and the fact that Alvarez, Rodo Sayagues and Diablo Cody all worked on the script, we haven't known much about the movie. Now, thanks to the upcoming American Film Market, we've got a synopsis that makes the movie sound like a carbon copy of Raimi's original. But a few more details that have come to light reveal ways in which the remake will veer off into slightly different territory.

Here's the synopsis that will be bandied about at the American Film Market, courtesy of STYD:

Five twenty-something friends become holed up in a remote cabin where they discover a Book Of The Dead and unwittingly summon up dormant demons living in the nearby woods, which possess the youngsters in succession until only one is left intact to fight for survival.

So: yeah. That's The Evil Dead, at least as far as story goes. We don't know anything about casting, other than the report that original Evil Dead star Bruce Campbell will cameo as a character other than his Deadite-fightin' alter-ego Ash. Without knowing if there is a character that'll be able to lead the charge against the dead and capture imaginations as well as Ash did, we don't know if this will really play like The Evil Dead.

This is the part where possible spoilers live:

Bloody Disgusting offers a couple additional bits of info: the kids all head to the cabin in order to help one of their number kick a serious drug habit. The site says "the "new spin" is the motivation behind the trip, with the lead character taking his younger sister to the family's cabin to help her kick her drug addiction. Without her drugs she becomes insane and difficult to control, which makes it impossible to see that she's actually possessed." And passages from the Book of the Dead, i.e. the spoken spells that awake the dead, are not played back via tape recording, but read by one of the young characters — someone who evidently has the ability to read ancient Sumerian, or whatever arcane language is written in the book.

Those are a couple of big differences. Neither will matter at all if the action follows in a way that feels true to the films, or even in a way that is simply effective and entertaining. So no judgement calls on the new ideas just yet.