The Evil Dead

The Evil Dead (1981)

57 mistakes - chronological order

(8 votes)

Audio problem: When their car is making a sharp turn at the beginning of the film, you can hear the tires screeching. This could only happen if they were on concrete, not on a dirt road. (00:01:15)

Continuity mistake: When Scotty honks, and the two guys on the side of the street wave their arms, the window of the car is suddenly open (it was closed before, as can be seen by the reflection) and then again is suddenly closed. (00:02:15)

Audio problem: In the beginning when the group is driving to the cabin the sound of the car mysteriously cuts out. You can hear branches breaking but you can tell they are dubbed because the car drags a large bush behind it with no noise. (00:03:50)

Continuity mistake: When the blond guy goes into the cabin in the beginning, it goes from day when he's walking in, to completely dark once he's opened the door and gone in. (00:06:00)

Visible crew/equipment: When Scotty enters the cabin for the very first time, he walks around for a moment. As he passes a window look into the reflection. You can barely see a man dressed all in black holding the camera. His brown equipment belt is very visible. (00:06:20)

Continuity mistake: After the dead possesses Cheryl to draw the book of the dead in her sketch pad, in the last shot of the pad as Cheryl lifts it up, the drawing has additional and extended lines and smudges have appeared/disappeared. (00:08:35)

Hamster

Visible crew/equipment: When the cellar door 'opens itself' look very close, and for a few seconds you can see the arm of a crew member pushing up the cellar door, then quickly pulling their arm back down. (00:09:30)

Hamster

Revealing mistake: When Ash is exploring the basement, he only has a lantern that would cast a flickering yellow light for illumination. Instead, all of the basement is lit with strong, steady white light, awfully like stage lights... (00:13:35)

Phoenix

Continuity mistake: When Ash first finds the book of the dead, he opens it, and in a closeup we see he's on a page with many skulls drawn on it. It cuts and the page he is on is different, with one big skull on it. (00:15:00)

Hamster

Continuity mistake: Before everyone listens to the tape, you can see that Ash is sitting to the left of Linda, but in the next shot, Ash is by Linda's right. (00:15:40)

Hamster

The Evil Dead mistake picture

Revealing mistake: In all the nighttime scenes in the woods where the moon is shown, you can see the clear edges of the matte they used to show the moon. The color of the entire woods set is almost black except for the navy blue "rectangle" around the moon. (00:22:40)

Revealing mistake: When Cheryl is being attacked by the trees, the branches are wrapping around her. You can see that, in the close-up shot of her right arm, the branch going around her arm is actually twisted yellow rope twine, NOT a branch! (00:24:15)

The Evil Dead mistake picture

Continuity mistake: When Cheryl is running through the woods, she is wearing slippers that stay on up until she reaches the cabin door. However, in following shots, she is shown barefoot, and when Ash opens the door her foot is dirty as if she'd been running barefoot the whole time. (00:28:05 - 00:29:10)

Revealing mistake: When Evil Cheryl is being forced into the cellar with the butt of the axe, you can blatantly tell that it's a dummy. It's also obvious that when Cheryl gets her hand stuck in the cellar door, that it is a fake rubber hand, because it wobbles. (00:37:40)

Hamster

Continuity mistake: The actors' haircuts change a few times. This is noticeable when Scotty pulls back the bath curtain, and his hair is rather long and thick, but when he turns around, his hair is much shorter. Also, Linda's hair is short and wavy, but when she turns evil and she and Ash are fighting outside, her hair is very curly. (00:41:20)

Hamster

Continuity mistake: When Evil Shelley scratches Scotty's face, you can see her fingernails are very long. But when Shelley and Scotty are fighting by the fireplace, notice that in some shots her fingernails are much shorter, and in other shots they have totally disappeared. (00:41:30)

Hamster

Ash: You bastards, why are you torturing me like this? Why?

More quotes from The Evil Dead

Trivia: The cabin featured in this movie burned down shortly after filming. Sam Raimi and Robert Tapert continue to say that Bruce Campbell burned it down, but Campbell says "It just burned down".

More trivia for The Evil Dead

Join the mailing list

Separate from membership, this is to get updates about mistakes in recent releases. Addresses are not passed on to any third party, and are used solely for direct communication from this site. You can unsubscribe at any time.

Check out the mistake & trivia books, on Kindle and in paperback.