Drag me to hell
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | Drag me to hell |
| Original title | Drag me to hell |
| Country of production | United States |
| original language | English , Spanish |
| Publishing year | 2009 |
| length | Cinema: 99 minutes DVD: 95 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 16 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Sam Raimi |
| script | Sam Raimi, Ivan Raimi |
| production |
Grant Curtis , Rob Tapert , Sam Raimi (anonymous) |
| music | Christopher Young |
| camera | Peter Deming |
| cut | Bob Murawski |
| occupation | |
| |
Drag Me to Hell is a horror - thriller from the year 2009 by director Sam Raimi with Alison Lohman in the lead role. The film is based on an original script by the brothers Sam and Ivan Raimi .
action
Christine Brown, a bank clerk, is hoping to get the vacant position of deputy branch manager. However, her supervisor, Mr. Jacks, makes it clear to Christine that there is still another candidate and that a deputy branch manager also has tough decisions to make. She hands her fiancé a rare quarter coin, which he puts in an envelope. That day, one of Christine's customers called in, Mrs. Sylvia Ganush, an old, creepy gypsy who asked for an extension of a loan due. Christine tries to enforce this delay with her superior. However, Mr. Jacks leaves the decision to her, along with the hint that this is a "hard decision". Christine understands the hint and tells Mrs. Ganush that a delay is unfortunately not an option. She begs Christine and urges her to give her the respite. Christine panics and calls security to escort Mrs. Ganush outside.
In the evening in the parking garage, Christine is attacked by Mrs. Ganush in her car. A lengthy struggle ensues; in the end, the gypsy tears a button off her jacket, hisses a few words at it and gives her the button back. In doing so, she predicts Christine that she will soon be the one who will beg her. Later that evening Christine and her boyfriend, the university professor Clay Dalton, visit the fortune teller Rham Jas and let him predict the future. He seems to be seeing something terrible, but doesn't want to go into it.
Later that evening, Christine was attacked again in her home. This time it is not the gypsy, but something disembodied. After some frightening things happen at the bank the next day, Christine decides to visit Mrs. Ganush to beg her forgiveness. However, she has to find out on the spot that she died the previous night. Christine then visits the fortune teller Rham Jas again. He explains to her that Lamia, a powerful demon , will threaten and attack her for three days before taking her to hell. The gypsy apparently cursed the torn button and turned the curse on Christine by giving her the button back. One way to break the curse might be through animal sacrifice; but this does not always calm Lamia. Christine decides to follow the advice and, after being attacked by Lamia again, sacrifices her cat with a heavy heart.
As the attacks continue, however, Rham Jas advises her to seek the help of the medium Shaun San Dena. San Dena tried to break a lamia curse about forty years ago - but to no avail. Even now she does not manage to kill the demon at the séance , she can only drive it away for a short time, but dies in the process. Rham Jas points out to Christine that she now only has one option: She has to give away the cursed item - i.e. the button - so that the curse is also passed on to the corresponding person. Rham Jas now closes the button in an envelope to be on the safe side. After extensive research, the option opens up for Christine to offer the curse to the deceased and she decides to give the button to the deceased Mrs. Ganush and thus to direct the curse back to the author. After she dug up the body in the cemetery and put the envelope with the button in her mouth, the curse seems to be broken.
The next morning, Christine heard from her supervisor by phone that she would be given the position of deputy branch manager. Later she meets with Clay at the train station to travel with him. Clay hands Christine the envelope with the button on it. On the way back from the séance she had mistaken it for the envelope with the collector's coin that was still in her fiancé's car and offered the corpse the coin instead of the button. Christine realizes with horror that the curse has not been passed on and falls in a panic on the track bed. Clay tries to pull her off the rails and save her from the approaching train, but at that moment the floor opens under Christine and Lamia's arms drag her into hell in front of Clay's horrified eyes.
background
- The cinema release in the USA was on May 29, 2009, in Germany and Austria on June 11, 2009.
Reviews
“A genre film that pays homage to the horror films of the 1950s and is aimed at a young audience. Despite a few moderate moments of shock, the film turns out to be a rather harmless game with the familiar parameters of the horror genre. "
“With 'Drag Me to Hell' Raimi is returning to his beginnings, at the beginning of the eighties, when he and his friends created the bloody demon shocker 'Evil Dead' and celebrated the freedom of the genre film, which brings together ghost train effects with minimal art. [...] A little horror film that reveals the core of the great economic and life crisis today - America and its dignity, America and its shame. "
“The film itself is like the prophecy it tells about: we know what is going to happen, but we never know when or how. So you leave the cinema no smarter, but wonderfully through the wind. "
“The interplay between horror and comedy is becoming more and more monstrous. [...] Because 'Drag Me To Hell' is horrible fun, but deadly serious as an Old Testament allegory: morality and capital do not get along. Actually a timeless film. "
“The fact that Raimi unabashedly uses the stereotype of the evil gypsy who bewitches her opponent with black magic fits into the concept. The fantastic side of the figure - including the wonderfully disgusting body defects of old women - is so ostentatiously noticeable that it is never quite clear how much of it comes from Christine's imagination. "
“What a mess! And how much fun it is! With 'Drag Me To Hell', horror specialist Sam Raimi is returning to its roots - and presenting a young banker as the heroine of an amusing, bloody horror shocker. [...] In a predictable cinema summer full of blockbuster sequels, 'Drag Me To Hell' is the unexpected original, a refreshing breeze for American horror cinema. "
Awards
- The film won a 2010 Saturn Award for Best Horror Film .
Others
Background info on Mrs. Ganush: the obituary states that she was born in the Hungarian village of Szentendre as Szilvia Újvári.
The film deals with eating disorders throughout. Christine poses as lactose intolerant in order to avoid a meal, although later in the film she shows by consuming ice cream that it is not there. When trying to have a dessert, it turns into blood. Other people do not react to the demon attacks, but only notice Christine's reactions. It is mentioned relatively early in the film that Christine used to be overweight, and a photo can be seen in her apartment of her as a child with the caption "Pork Queen". In a variety of Christine's visions, other people try to eat her flesh, vomit, or shove their extremities into her mouth. Visions show broken fingernails and hair loss, which are secondary symptoms of advanced anorexia .
Web links
- Drag Me to Hell in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- Drag Me to Hell in the Lexicon of International Films
Individual evidence
- ↑ Release certificate for Drag Me to Hell . Voluntary self-regulation of the film industry , May 2009 (PDF; test number: 118 081 K).
- ^ Fritz Göttler: Dance of the dirt queens . Süddeutsche Zeitung , June 10, 2009.
- ↑ Daniel Kothenschulte: Horror from Cannes: Out of balance . Frankfurter Rundschau , June 10, 2009
- ↑ On the term 'Old Testament' cf. Georg Freuling: Old Testament / Old Testament. In: Michaela Bauks, Klaus Koenen, Stefan Alkier (eds.): The scientific Bibellexikon on the Internet (WiBiLex), Stuttgart 2006 ff., Accessed on September 12, 2015 ..
- ↑ Christoph Huber: Sam Raimis hell trip of capitalism . The daily newspaper , June 11, 2009.
- ^ Career pressure with hellish consequences in Der Standard from June 12, 2009
- ↑ David Kleingers: Horror film "Drag Me To Hell": A visit to the blood bank . Spiegel Online , June 11, 2009