Unearthed Films is continuing its trend of releasing obscure and sometimes extreme horror films from around the world. They previously gave audiences the low-budget Japanese horror classic Evil Dead Trap on special edition Blu-ray. It was definitely a welcome surprise since the only time I had seen it was on a bootleg videotape in the early ’90s.
Back then, when trading tapes, you never knew what the quality would be or how many times it had been dubbed down from the source tape. You were lucky if you could make out what was happening on screen. The tape I had was pretty terrible quality-wise, and I never revisited the film or its 1992 sequel Evil Dead Trap 2: Hideki.
Thankfully, Unearthed has risen to the occasion once again, bringing the notorious sequel to Blu-ray for the first time here in the United States. While it bears little resemblance to the original and basically just borrows the title, it still delivers a highly entertaining experience for fans of the genre.
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A lunatic killer is terrorizing Japan by mutilating young women. A young projectionist named Aki (Shoko Nakajima) is being haunted by what she believes to be the ghost of a child. Emi (Rie Kondoh) is her best friend as well as a television news reporter who has been covering the heinous crimes. Emi and Aki meet Kurahashi (Shiro Sano), a married man fighting demons from his past. He isn’t the only one hiding things, and they soon find themselves losing control to forces beyond their comprehension. The evil will take them places they never knew existed, dragging them through nightmare after nightmare until the dark truth is revealed.
Evil Dead Trap 2 Hideki takes you on a surrealistic journey, one that keeps you guessing and questioning what is actually happening. Director Izo Hashimoto obviously came from the school of Dario Argento; he harbors a very similar style, especially when it comes to lighting. The pacing moves a little too slowly at times, but when you look at the film as a whole, it works when it really shouldn’t.
The transfer is crisp, and the color palette pops, giving a much stronger appreciation of what the director was trying to do, which most likely would have been lost on viewers watching subpar copies back in the day. While the quality of the sound and picture is top shelf, there are little to no real extras included, which is a bit of a shame. Either way, it’s great to see the film in a much more pristine version and definitely worth giving it some of your time.
