Embodiment of Evil (2008)

Author: Brett Gallman
Submitted by: Brett Gallman   Date : 2017-04-17 00:18
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Written by: Dennison Ramalho (screenplay), José Mojica Marins (screenplay)
Directed by: José Mojica Marins
Starring: José Mojica Marins, Jece Valadão, and Adriano Stuart

Reviewed by: Brett Gallman (@brettgallman)





"In the past I did everything possible to find the woman who'd give me immortality. And the continuation of my blood."


Resurrections rarely come as belated and unexpected as the one in Embodiment of Evil. 41 years after last playing Coffin Joe in an official capacity in This Night I’ll Possess Your Corpse, writer/director/provocateur Jose Mojica Marins donned his signature top hat and elongated fingernails for one last outing as Brazil’s preeminent horror icon. It was an interesting proposition to say the least—not only was Coffin Joe returning after a long layoff, but the gap between these two sequels is among the widest of any in the history of film. In fact, it might be the longest to feature a return its primary creative force, as the other examples typically involve other folks altogether picking up the reins to cash in on a legacy.

Embodiment of Evil is no mere cash-in, though, because what’s even more unlikely about the ordeal is just how fucking good it managed to be. Somehow, after not directing a feature since 1979, Marins effortlessly delivers a follow-up that’s more than worthy of the legacy it inherited from two of the greatest cult movies of all-time. You could be forgiven for being skeptical given the long layoff, but Marins obliterates them over the course of another 94 deranged minutes spent with Coffin Joe.

There has never been a franchise or icon quite like Coffin Joe, so it’s fitting that he goes out with this unusually belated final entry, which accounts for the 40 years that have passed since the previous film. During that time, Coffin Joe has been incarcerated in a mental ward where he’s continued his reign of bloody terror; despite this, however, officials are convinced he’s been rehabilitated and can return to society. Upon being picked up at the prison by his loyal servant Bruno (Rui Rezende), Joe immediately sets his sights on resuming his lifelong quest of siring a child so his legacy can live on forever. Yes, after all this time, Joe has not changed much—if at all, as he’s also still just as unhinged as ever.

The world around him certainly has changed, however, and it’s one of the first aspects of Embodiment of Evil that you have to adjust to. Something about the previous two Coffin Joe films feel like demented fairy tales, almost as if they were out of any semblance of actual time or reality. On the other hand, this one most definitely unfolds in present-day Brazil, and it’s a bit jarring to see Coffin Joe wandering its modern city streets. He initially feels like a fish out of water, and you wonder if Marins will be able to recapture the dark, primal magic of those earlier films couched in such a familiar, almost demystifying milieu. In the previous films, Coffin Joe felt like a mystical force spawned straight from the depths of hell itself; in this one, he feels more like an ordinary man, one that’s been weathered by time and age—at least at first.

Eventually, though, Marins does tap into the surreal, freak-out energy that has always defined the Coffin Joe franchise. His signature mix of ethereal atmosphere and cruel, grisly violence is more pronounced than ever, especially the latter. Arriving right in the middle of the last decade’s torture phase, Embodiment of Evil feels like Marins’s bemused response to the whole thing. It almost takes on the tenor of the master—in this case, Marins was a forefather of gore—returning to show how it’s really done, and he doesn’t disappoint: Joe’s sick outbursts are as gross as ever, as he subjects both his latest victims and his band of followers to various torments. Included among them are scenes where he implores folks to possibly commit suicide, and a bit where he literally cuts flesh off a woman’s ass and feeds it to her—and these are the people he likes, so you can imagine what he reserves for the foes that have dared crossed him. (Let’s just say that one bit involves butter, a rat, and a vagina—not for the faint of heart for sure.)

But like the previous films, Embodiment of Evil is no mere gore fest. More than ever, Marins is committed to crafting the kookiest, most off-kilter vibe imaginable, and goes to great lengths to do so. I’m talking Jodorowski-esque lengths here: one scene has Joe visited by a mysterious albino that takes him on a tour through a woman’s vagina that ends in an arid, purgatorial wasteland. It makes Joe’s previous visit to Hell look quaint by comparison, and it’s fueled by the same nightmarish sense of bewilderment. As always, there’s something hallucinatory about the entire experience, almost as if Marins captured a fevered vision quest and committed it to film. Audiences float alongside Joe through this increasingly phantasmal trip through Joe’s past, present, and future, all of which are refracted into a climax that’s appropriately set in a literal funhouse. On one level, Marins has always been something of a carnival huckster, so it’s fitting that his life’s work culminates in such a manner.

And it’s that sense of history that gives Embodiment of Evil an added dimension of significance. Marins accounts for the weight of all the years encompassing the 45-year Coffin Joe saga. Not only is Joe eventually haunted by past victims (in the form of both stock footage of the previous films and black-and-white specters), but his past catches up to him when an old foe comes seeking revenge. Via a flashback that reveals how Joe actually survived the previous film, we learn that he emerged from the bog and plucked out a police officer’s eye; years later, that officer has become a captain who harbors a grudge, and he teams up with the son of another victim (a jacked-up, self-flagellating priest) to finally rid the world of the unhinged gravedigger once and for all. On the other hand, Joe's legend has spawned his share of cultists more than willing to carry out his bidding in his battle against these two. This forms the crux of the conflict in Embodiment of Evil, a film that just feels like the epic conclusion so few horror franchises actually have. Rather than peter out because of poor box office returns, the Coffin Joe saga goes out with a definitive send-off. It’s less a conclusion and more of a reckoning, with Joe’s past sins and future hopes colliding in a violent sprawl.

Of course, it wouldn’t be a proper Coffin Joe movie without a pronounced defiant streak running through the entire thing. Joe is more unrepentant than ever—he’s still cursing God and laughing at the folly of anyone who dares to believe. And yet, he’s very much the hero of the film—no, not the anti-hero, but the actual, straight-up hero. Sure, he forms his own death cult, but he also stands up for those in the community victimized by the corrupt police force. Likewise, the religious institutions are represented by their own unhinged spirit of vengeance, allowing Marins to further blur the lines between good and evil. By the end, it’s clear which side Marins takes, as Joe’s last act of defiance has him spitting in the face of death itself, and you can’t help but smile a bit when the film reveals his legacy will endure. Somehow, there’s something comforting about that—believe it or not, he’s an endearing figure, as horror icons—no matter how perverse or deranged they may be—often are.

But unlike so many of those icons, Joe’s swan song feels sincere and authentic. One can’t imagine further Coffin Joe movies following this one, not since Marins himself have been so inexorably tied to the role, and, while I’d certainly welcome another film with him at the helm, it seems quite unlikely. Instead, Embodiment of Evil feels like the rare final chapter that will stick, and fans are left with one of the horror genre’s greatest—and perhaps most unlikely—success stories. From the beginning, Coffin Joe has endured despite, well, everything: even though At Midnight I’ll Take Your Soul would have been among the most blasphemous and confrontational dispatches imaginable, Joe (and, by proxy, Marin) went on to become a genuine icon, so much so that even a 40-year layoff couldn’t keep him down.

You don’t expect to feel such a sense of valediction when dealing with a franchise where the main character has tortured and killed scores of people, but here we are. So ends one of horror’s most depraved, lyrical, and existential horror franchises: always a bundle of contradictions, Coffin Joe left the world with one last disgusting, blasphemous, yet artful transmission, a definitive exclamation mark punctuating the end of a storied career.



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