Miracle man

Jeremy Renner’s ‘Rennervations’ shows off the community he loves; ‘Evil Dead Rise’ delivers scares and gore

Mere months after getting horribly crushed under his own snowplow, Jeremy Renner—truly some sort of superhero here on Earth—is not only making an amazing recovery, but showing up, in person, in Reno for the premiere of his latest project.

The area resident nearly died on New Year’s Day while trying to dig a family vehicle out of the snow, yet there he is, walking around Reno with a big smile on his face for the showing of the Reno episode of Rennervations.

The four-episode Disney+ show features Renner retooling some old vehicles he’s bought for good causes. In the case of Reno, he renovated a minibus to be a recreational vehicle for Big Brothers Big Sisters of Northern Nevada. Using his own dough, he equipped the vehicle with computers, a lounge, a soccer goal on the side, and a basketball hoop on the back.

I’m a sucker for renovation shows, so getting to see Renner do his own for Disney is good fun. The Reno episode features a good-natured Renner and contractors he’s hired, along with guest star Anthony Mackie, who made a Reno appearance for the christening of the recreational vehicle.

Within seconds of this episode starting, you get a prominent shot of the Heather Puckett, standing outside of Junkee Clothing Exchange, followed by all sorts of Reno sights and references. Renner’s love for the area is very evident, and you can tell he’s putting a little extra oomph into the Reno episode because of it.

I am glad to watch this show knowing that Hawkeye is not only alive and well, but kicking recovery ass as he comes back from his near-death experience.

He’s an extraordinary guy, and a big fan of Reno. As a big fan of Reno, myself, I very much appreciate his presence and his efforts.

Rennervations is now streaming on Disney+.

Evil Dead Rise does just enough to be decent movie. It’s gory; it’s intermittently scary; and it has enough franchise Easter eggs to get the vibe right—the darker side of the vibe, that is.

Rise plays a little like the Fede Alvarez 2013 Evil Dead reboot in that it is gloomy, gory and almost humorless, much like Sam Raimi’s original The Evil Dead, a brutal 1981 film which starred Bruce Campbell as horror icon Ash Williams.

The franchise turned toward horror comedy with Evil Dead II (1987), a trajectory that

| BY BOB GRIMM

continued through Army of Darkness (aka Evil Dead III) and the tremendously fun TV series Ash vs. Evil Dead, which, from 2015-2018, gave us 30 episodes of Campbell in all his glory.

Before the show debuted, Alvarez’s Evil Dead tried to re-establish the film franchise. While it was not a failure, it never spawned a sequel, with Raimi and company deciding to go the Ash/TV Exorcist-meets-the-Three Stooges route. I rewatched the 2013 Evil Dead recently, and it’s better than I remembered, perhaps the strongest Evil Dead movie other than Raimi’s.

That’s not to say Evil Dead Rise isn’t any good. It feels like the filmmakers are going through the motions rather than advancing the story and the lore—although those motions involve some first-rate gore and scares. As a horror aficionado, I can say Evil Dead Rise delivers as a pitch-black splatter-fest that I’m happy I experienced, even though it left me feeling a little unfulfilled.

The film starts, inexplicably, at a lakeside cabin, where some typical blood-spilling takes place before the opening credits. This is a bit of a fake-out, because the action immediately shifts to one year earlier, in a Los Angeles apartment inhabited by a mom, Ellie (Alyssa Sutherland), and her two kids, Bridget (Gabrielle Echols) and Danny (Morgan Davies). They are visited by Ellie’s sister, Beth (Lily Sullivan); everyone is going through some form of internal or family turmoil.

Danny stumbles upon a strange, nastylooking book bound in human flesh, as well as some old vinyl records—and Evil Dead fans instantly know this spells trouble. Some incantations are read aloud; a POV camera representing a demon force races into the apartment building; and Ellie finds herself gruesomely possessed.

Writer-director Lee Cronin does a good job of isolating the family in the apartment building, much like all of those prior Evil Dead film victims were doomed in lonely cabins. Yes, they are in L.A., and yes, they have neighbors, but it might as well be a cabin in the woods, because they are basically stuck in their small apartment with nowhere to go. There are a few scenes of carnage seen through a keyhole that count as the film’s best moments.

The movie does feel a little small, and its lower budget is evident in its low number of set pieces; this is probably due to the fact that it was meant to go to HBO Max rather than theaters. Positive receptions at film festivals continued on next page

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| BY BOB GRIMM