Directed by Sam Raimi — Screenplay by Mark Swift and Damian Shannon.
As I like to remind my readers, my dad had an open mind when it came to what movies my sister and I were ready to watch at a young age. So, as it turned out, when I was a kid, one of my favorite movie characters was Bruce Campbell’s Ash Williams from Sam Raimi’s Evil Dead films (I even dressed up as Ash for Halloween recently). Of those Evil Dead films, Army of Darkness, especially, holds a special place in my heart. As Sam Raimi then transitioned from indie horror to superhero spectacle (with several studio films in between) with his Spider-Man films, which were released as I was growing up, Sam Raimi quickly became one of my favorite filmmakers. Therefore, I was especially excited when I found out that Raimi was going to have an R-Rated original horror-comedy come out in early 2026. Send Help, in which Rachel McAdams re-teams with her Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness director, is that film, and it is so exciting to be able to say that Raimi’s film not only works but is a strong reminder of what made so many of us fall for his brand of cinema in the first place.
Sam Raimi’s Send Help follows Laura Liddle (played by Rachel McAdams), a submissive, socially awkward, but hard-working corporate strategist, who has long been promised a promotion with the financial management company that she works for. When her boss passes, and his son, Bradley Preston (played by Dylan O’Brien), takes over as CEO, she is under the expectation that Bradley will follow his father’s wishes and give her the well-deserved promotion. However, the self-obsessed rookie CEO opts to offer the position to his best friend at the company, who, it just so happens, has long been taking credit for Laura’s work. Unable to break into the new boys’ club at the company, Laura is even informed that Bradley intends to move her to an even less favorable position than she is already in. Under the instruction of a senior executive at the firm (played by Dennis Haysbert), Bradley offers Laura the opportunity to prove herself and tag along on a business trip to Bangkok. However, their private plane to Bangkok encounters serious issues and eventually crashes violently into the ocean. The only survivors are Laura and a now-injured Bradley, both of whom now find themselves stranded on a remote island in the Gulf of Thailand. While Bradley struggles with his new reality, Laura, an avid Survivor fan and would-be contestant, is uniquely suited to their new predicament. As tensions rise between them, a new power dynamic emerges, and, eventually, violence ensues.
For those who may have feared that Sam Raimi’s stylistic touches might be subdued now that he’s in his late sixties, rest assured that Send Help, though primarily a survival horror film, has all the Raimi-esque horror-comedy goodness and stylistic trademarks that you could possibly want. The film features gushing bodily fluids, plenty of blood-soaked action, slapstick-like comedy, inventive editing flair, over-the-top violence, extreme close-ups of eyes, teeth, or rings, and, of course, kinetic camerawork (this time around, the classic Evil Dead POV-shot is used for a boar). The film not only features these elements but is also successfully funny, while at the same time being chock-full of horror elements such as ghostly visions, jump scares, and the like.
Conceptually, it feels both like Sam Raimi’s take on Cast Away and, more precisely, as his take on Triangle of Sadness. Admittedly, it doesn’t quite have as many original ideas locked away, but the Raimi trademarks help to keep it fresh enough, even though it is perhaps slightly overlong. Although, as I said, it features plenty of gushing bodily fluids, the film, which I saw in 2D (it was nice to see that the auditorium was relatively well-attended), is also clearly filmed for 3D, which can be distracting.
While Sam Raimi’s flourishes are the main reason why it’s so nice to see this film, the film is further elevated by the committed lead performances from O’Brien and McAdams. Dylan O’Brien takes his infuriating and self-obsessed boss and plays him with glee. He has this pathetic laugh that goes from becoming annoying to quite fun as the film goes on, and he makes for a solid dickish adversary to the film’s protagonist. I’ll also highlight his great work in a close-up where he does a good job of selling his character’s paralyzed terror. Across from him, Rachel McAdams gives one of her career’s best lead performances. Although it is perhaps a stretch of the film to try to convince us that someone like Rachel McAdams is a bird-lady spinster-type, she gives it her all to sell those qualities through an enthusiastic, full-bodied performance. She really throws herself at the role, and later becomes a fully believable Survivor-heroine, capable of doing what it takes to assert her dominance.
As such, though Sam Raimi’s Send Help is perhaps ever so slightly too long, it marks an exciting return to what made the director beloved in the first place. It features strong performances from its two leads, as well as all the stylistic flourishes and trademarks that a Sam Raimi fan could want from a film of his. It is a very good time at the movies for Raimi fans, who may have missed his original horror brand of filmmaking, given his last original genre film was released 17 years ago this year.
7.9 out of 10
– Review written by Jeffrey Rex Bertelsen.
I'm Jeffrey Rex 