[Inspector Abberline]

Dark Man.
A somewhat neglected film from Mr Raimi's career, people either think Evil Dead or Spiderman, depending on weather you favour his early films or his later stuff. I do not think I had watched this since it’s intial release all those years ago, and of course being a diehard Evil Dead fan I was wanting bucket’s of gore, and not slapstick cartoon violence, that we saw with the likes of Crime wave.. Still after my recent repeated viewing of Dark Man, I believe time has been good to this cartoon life action film. For one thing I was impressed with Liam Neeson performance, I’m not his biggest fan and usually find him a bit one dimensional and dare I say wooden, but here he really shows some diversity and also some manic energy which is usually missing from his performances, most films he seems to just phone in his performance, how many variations on Taken can you make for the love of Buddha. Also what struck me more watching the film this time round was how good the make-up effects are on the Dark Man himself, with the burned scarring and the protruding teeth coming out of his skull, looking excellent and gruesome in equal measure Hi-Def. Of course no Raimi movie was complete back then without all those crazy camera angles, and fast zoom ins, which can grate after a while and detract from the action. Also a major thumbs up to Larry Drake filling the bad guy role so admirably, and stomping around like a rather large baby chewing his way through the scenery...Later to be seen in the rather underrated Dr Giggles...