Horror author Stephen King gave a rave review of the film, which resulted in New Line Cinema acquiring its distribution rights. The completed film attracted the interest of producer Irvin Shapiro, who helped screen the film at the 1982 Cannes Film Festival.

Principal photography took place on location in a remote cabin located in Morristown, Tennessee, in a difficult filming process that proved extremely uncomfortable for the cast and crew the film's extensive prosthetic makeup effects and stop-motion animations were created by artist Tom Sullivan. Raimi, Tapert, Campbell and their friends produced the short film Within the Woods as a proof of concept to build the interest of potential investors, which secured US$90,000 to begin work on The Evil Dead. After they find an audio tape that, when played, releases a legion of demons and spirits, four members of the group suffer from demonic possession, forcing the fifth member, Ash Williams (Campbell), to survive an onslaught of increasingly gory mayhem. The film focuses on five college students vacationing in an isolated cabin in a remote wooded area. The Evil Dead is a 1981 American supernatural horror film written and directed by Sam Raimi, produced by Robert Tapert and executive produced by Raimi, Tapert, and Bruce Campbell, who also starred alongside Ellen Sandweiss, Richard DeManicor, Betsy Baker and Theresa Tilly.

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