August 2, 2018
Written by: Anders Jacobsson, Göran Lundström, Christer Ohlsso
Starring: Johan Rudebeck, Per Löfberg, Olof Rhodin
Budget: 250,000 (SEK)
Quote: There is a scene in this movie were a girl get's raped by a beaver and is then shot in the head with a bazooka
Trivia: Sweden had until 1996 a policy about censor any movies that had any sex or violence scenes. Evil Ed was actually made as a protest against that policy.
Man, this was a really great film! It was heavily inspired by Sam Raimi's Evil Dead movies (hence the title) but felt more at home with Peter Jackson's early gore fest films: Bad Taste and Dead Alive. The film matches intense gore with slapstick comedy in the best possible way. Honestly, I haven't seen a film do this since those Raimi and Jackson films. Also, the film was created to be as gross as possible as a protest against the strict censorship laws of Sweden. And any time someone can take a shot at censorship, I am all for it! The movie was so effective that the filmmakers were publicly ridiculed on television by the head of the Swedish Film Institute. If it were me, I would proudly display that fact on every business card I had.
The film is about a guy named Edward whose job is to be the censor for the Loose Limbs slasher horror film series. As he is forced to continually watch and edit these films he quickly becomes a deranged psycho himself beginning with him hearing and seeing things until becomes Evil Ed and tries to murder two of his colleagues and his family. The Swedish special forces are brought in to quell him, but they fail...
The character of Edward is great in this film and the Evil Ed that he becomes is almost unrecognizable to the original character. I love the quick escalation to full blown psychopath that he goes through. At first it is just noises, and then there is a monster in the refrigerator that throws food at him, until he becomes the character from Loose Limbs imitating scenes that he was forced to watch in the film.
Loose Limbs, the fictional horror film series that he is forced to watch, has some truly great moments. During once scene that he watches, the film's killer follows a lady into a parking garage who then disrobes and asks, "Do you want my body?" to which the killer responds, "I only want pieces!" and hacks off her arm and then begins headbutting he partially severed arm. During another scene we can hear from the movie that is playing off camera the line, "It's molesting time!" which is apparently the killer's catch phrase. And in another scene, Edward describes to his wife one of the Loose Limbs scenes, "There is a scene in the movie where a girl gets raped by a beaver and is then shot in the head with a bazooka."
The Loose Limbs film slasher film series is meant to parody horror films in general and just how stupid and fun they are. It is funny to think that actual uptight censors had to have conversations about beaver rape scenes and the idea that watching these stupid gross out movies would have a dire affect on anyone is preposterous. Evil Ed gives the movie censors exactly what they wanted: their worst nightmare come true. Censors claimed that violent films would make people violent so Evil Ed shows them exactly how this would look. It is so over-the-top that it really does make their entire argument seem foolish. It also asks the question, that if these movies are really so dangerous, then what affect could they have on the censors who so gleefully watch and edit them?
The film also parodies the moral crusader roles that film censors like to think of themselves as. The studio head for the Loose Limbs film series at some point in the film turns into Satan himself, meanwhile a robbed mental patient reassures Edward that he is doing God's work. The mental patient is meant to represent that moral attitude which comes from nothing more than delusions and a feeling of self-righteousness.
Funny, political, gory, this film is great and Sweden hopefully realizes what a national treasure they have here!
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