Dallas Fisher

The only help Sam Raimi, Rachel McAdams, and Dylan O’Brien are going to need is spreading the word on this movie, because it is a blast. 

Right off the bat, this is a quintessential Raimi film. He’s been off the radar as far as original films go for 15 years, but he did not miss a single beat. Obviously you expect a film from him to be campy and this does the perfect job of mixing that in with the many genres that fill this runtime without being over the top. To say it fits the mold of everything Sam has done in the past would be a huge understatement. It may be the most him he has ever been.

In a movie that is basically two people on an island for two hours, it does a bang up job of keeping you interested in what those two are doing. At the heart of all that is Rachel McAdams, the real bread winner of this McDadams-O’Brien duo. Her performance in this film is honestly Oscar-worthy. I know that’s not the end all be all for an actor, but for the type of movie she’s doing these incredible things in is saying something. She not only takes charge with her loveable and positive attitude, but she brings the heat by being unhinged and unpredictable. That unpredictability keeps the audience on its toes by having you triple guess who is the craziest of the two.

The other half of the pair is obviously Dylan O’Brien, who is brilliant here. He is perfectly an ungrateful asshole. That can be an easy thing to do, but he is so convincing that it almost makes you hate him in real life. If it weren’t for the all time movie laugh, I might have had a real problem. Dylan’s relentless nature is so admirable and honestly both actors look like they’re having such a fun time playing their roles. I love when you can see that joy in actors’ eyes, even in roles that are animalistic at the core.

Going back to the island, it’s full of more possibilities than I ever thought possible. You can easily compare this to Cast Away and that’s totally fair, but it takes it in such surprising and wonderful directions. Character choices are to die for and it is laugh out loud funny. Pin pointing this into one group of movie fans will be tough because I think there is something here for most people, especially fans of the three big names attached. 

8/10