Sébastien Vaniček Sought to “Make the Most Violent and the Most Brutal” ‘Evil Dead’ Film with ‘Evil Dead Burn’ [Interview]

Sébastien Vaniček‘s Evil Dead Burn rips into theaters this weekend. With it, the sixth film in the franchise created by Sam Raimi brings the most aggressive, brutal, outrageously gory entry yet. I watched it over a week ago, and I still don’t feel as if I’ve washed off all the muck and grime it left drenching my flesh. This thing is mean, it is nasty, and it’s about to lay a fiery hammer down on unsuspecting audiences.

In fact, based on Vaniček’s excellent creepy-crawly film, Infested, I’d argue horror fans aren’t ready for what the filmmaker is unleashing with Evil Dead Burn. While that film has its fair share of skin-crawling nastiness, it doesn’t feature much gore. There’s a restraint present that keeps the focus on the psychological element of running through a dark building with giant spiders. But Evil Dead isn’t about “restraint”. The franchise doesn’t even know the meaning of the word. And that’s exactly the mindset Vaniček approached the film with.

I sat down with the exciting young talent as he prepares for his sophomore feature to rage on screens. Top of mind was a question I believe most will be asking as they stumble wearily out of theaters…how the hell did that get an R-rating?

“We had to trim little bits. The original cut had an NC-17. And they aimed for a particular scene where I was like, okay, that’s the moment where it’s going a little bit too far,” said Vaniček. “And that’s the goal of Evil Dead, to go as far as you can. So at some point, you just have to leverage a little bit and trim a little bit. We didn’t remove anything. We just played a little bit with things.”