TriStar A scene from “Evil Dead.â€AUSTIN, Tex. â€" Watching genre films and comedies with a South by Southwest audience makes a strong case for the power of the theatrical experience and the value of its preservation. The crowds in Austin dive into festival films with enthusiasm and vigor, which makes them ideal for filmmakers eager to see how their films play to genre-loving fans, giving some indication of how the films might be met by audiences around the country.
The most high-profile horror example of that in this year’s festival is “Evil Dead,†from the director Fede Alvarez. This remake of Sam Raimi’s 1981 horror/comedy is set fora wide release April 12. It had its world premiere in Austin on Friday night. Some attendees were buzzing before the screening with different comments. Why remake a classic What has this director done before Why is it taking so long for the screening to start But whatever concerns the audience had at the Paramount Theater dissipated when the lights went down.
The film’s high-energy and operatically violent prologue set the tone for the evening and had the audience bursting into cheers by the time the opening title displayed on the screen. As the blood kept letting and limbs kept flying, viewers kept celebrating. Sitting next to the mother of one of the actors, I wondered what she was thinking while watching her son’s character get stabbed, beaten and pelted with nails from a nail gun. But it seemed clear what many of the other audience members were thinking: awesome.
Alex Lombardi Ken Marino in “Milo.â€Two other films screened at the festival on Sunday provoked vivid crowd reactions. First there was the world premiere of “Milo,†Jacob Vaughan’s offbeat horror/comedy starring Ken Marino as Duncan, a man with a demon creature living in his intestines. When things get stressful, the creature emerges and wreaks havoc on those causing problems in Duncan’s life. The audience, which included distributors and some of the cast and crew, settled into the movie’s tone and chuckled plentifully. A team of respected comedy actors in supporting roles, including Patrick Warburton, Stephen Root and Kumail Nanjiani, help increase the laugh quotient. It’s the kind of movie that could go either way with an audience, but the crowd went for it more frequently than not.
Then came “You’re Next,†a home-invasion horror film from the director Adam Wingard and the writer Simon Barrett. Introducing the screening, Mr. Wingard stressed his interest in making a movie that was meant to be seen with an audience. The film contains the kinds of thrills and shifts in tone that seek to keep the audience guessing (and flinching). The biggest crowd response was to the performance of the Australian actress Sharni Vinson, whose character goes into full-on action-star survivalist mode when the narrative heats up. Her willingness and ability to fight back powerfully, and through hardcore means, elicited frequent applause. The film also contains plenty! of humor! and some of its dialogue drew big laughs. Lionsgate is hoping for as lively a response when it releases the film later this year.
