Evil Dead Trap
(aka; Shiryo No Wana) 
(Synapse Region 0 NTSC DVD)
(1988)
  review by Head Cheeze

Sometimes you walk into the local DVD store, see a movie box, and say "What the hell?". That's what I did with Evil Dead Trap, and man, was I stoked, because this is one of my fave horror flicks ever.

Originally released as Shiryo no wana, some genius decided to slap this sillytitle on the movie for international release, and more than likely scared awaypotential viewers fearful of an Evil Dead rip-off. What this movie is, however, is nothing like you have ever seen. It's a clever Japanese Giallo, soaked in Argento-esque atmosphere, super-violent, sexually charged, and stunningly original. I watched this film with zero expectations and as the end credits rolled up, I watched it again. Then I made everyone I know watch it. It's
that friggin' cool.

The movie centers around Nomi (Ono), a host of a late night exploitation video show who recieves a strange submission of a very realistic murder on tape. The video shows us the route to the "crime scene" and ends with Nomi's face superimposed on the victim. Needless to say, this not only scares Nomi, but also awakens her journalistic spirit, and she enlists her crew to follow the directions on the video to a desolate military base in the hopes that she will
uncover a real story and leave the tabloid journalism behind her once and for all. When the team arrives, the wander about the abandoned base in search of any clues that may lead to the whereabouts of the video's author, or the "alleged" victim, but, of course, the author finds them first.

Evil Dead Trap (HATE that title!) is one of the finest examples of Japanese ultra-violent horror. The amount of gore and creativity
in the film's death scenes rival some of Argento's finest while the
film is shot with a color palette that once again hint's at it's Euro influenceswith camerawork that is truly dynamic stuff.

The only letdown is the films rather bizarre ending which seems like it was lifted from a Chronenberg flick, and will definitely have some people scratchin their heads.

The ending aside, Evil Dead Trap is a must see.

Synapse Films presents this movie in a great transfer considering it's age andlow budget origins, with commentary, theatrical trailers, and some stills and behind the scenes stuff. The commentary is unintentionally funny because the director and his co-commentator are obviously uncomfortable with English and you get a lot of "This is nice" and "Yes, it is nice" kind of stuff. Trust me, it's not the worst commentary I've ever heard, and they seem to be more capable of expressing themselves than Schwarezenneger and Verhoeven on the awful Total Recall (SE) commentary.

Hunt this movie down. I've seen it at Best Buy for $14.95, which is a bargain!!