Whenever Sam Raimi gets some time off from franchise filmmaking, he returns to his favorite pastimes: ambiguous characters, survival situations and (forewarning) indulgent grossness.
An Honest Review of Sam Raimi’s Send Help
For the past few decades, he hasn’t had much opportunity for passion projects. In the 2000s, he helmed the gargantuan Spider-Man trilogy, a blockbuster demonstration of the narrative power and global appeal of superhero tales. In 2013, he tried to get Disney into the Oz business, taking the reins on the visually inventive but forgettable Oz the Great and Powerful. (Perhaps the Mouse should’ve gone for the Wicked rights.) Later that decade, he returned to the comic-book game; after some delays, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness proved a mixed success.
In the past quarter-century, then, he’s had just two opportunities to return to his roots. The first is 2009’s Drag Me to Hell, a campy yet occasionally troubling tale about a mild-mannered woman driven to extremes to survive. Then there’s this year’s Send Help, a campy yet occasionally troubling tale about a mild-mannered woman driven to extremes to survive.
He likes what he likes. And it’s usually pretty entertaining.
Making Movies on the Workplace
He also, at least in Drag Me to Hell and Send Help, enjoys a bit of corporate commentary — or at least the appearance of it. The latter film stars Rachel McAdams as Linda Liddle, a frumpy middle-management type who toils in an undefined corporations strategy and planning department. She’s convinced her years of dogged service will land her a promotion and the attention of the dashing young CEO, Bradley Preston (Dylan O’Brien). Unfortunately, he’s got a fraternity buddy to promote — and he’s put off by Liddle’s unrefined exterior. (Casting the undeniably gorgeous Rachel McAdams as a Plain Jane stretches credulity, despite McAdams’ considerable acting chops.)
Preston invites Liddle to join a planned business trip to Bangkok, partially out of pity and partially to provide the boys’ club with a carry-on subject of ridicule. The plane crashes into the ocean in a harrowing sequence; only Liddle and Preston survive, finding themselves marooned on a desert island. Fortunately, Liddle is prepared; a devotee of the reality series Survivor, she’s been training for decades for just such a scenario. Whether Preston will accept that his former scapegoat is now his only chance at survival remains at question — all the way through the final reel.
Well… Maybe Don’t Send Help Too Quickly…
The marketing for Send Help has been primarily as a corporate satire, selling itself as an inversion of intraoffice power dynamics. To Raimi — and co-screenwriters Mark Swift and Damian Shannon, best known for the slasher-fight curiosity Freddy vs. Jason — this is just an opportunity for twists and shocks in an island paradise. (Drag Me to Hell had a similar relationship with current affairs, using the housing crisis as the backdrop to a tale of demonic curses.) The end product is far from cohesive and decidedly indulgent, but damn good fun — provided, of course, you’re comfortable with all manner of on-screen viscera and violence.
If it’s ever too much, just look at the sandy beaches in the background.
Others Movies Coming Out at the End of January 2026
Elsewhere at the multiplex, Jason Statham has typical business to deal with in Shelter, an actioner about — what else — an assassin on the run. This one has a sturdy supporting cast, though, including the unimpeachable Bill Nighy and rising star Naomi Ackie (who had a phenomenal 2025 thanks to Mickey 17 and Sorry, Baby). Reviews haven’t dropped yet, but there’s slightly more buzz around this one than the typical January beat-em-up … A pair of curiosities are also theater-bound this weekend.
Iron Lung, a dark scifi/horror fable, is the feature debut of YouTube star Mark “Markiplier” Fischbach. He financed — and directed, wrote and edited — the picture himself, so it’s hard to know what to expect. (Given the size of his audience, though, it will hardly matter.)
Meanwhile, A24 releases the mockumentary, The Moment, starring Charlie XCX in a spoof of her own world tour…
On the small screen, build anticipation for the Milan Olympics with a viewing of the new doc Miracle: The Boys of ’80, an account of the underdog American hockey team that famously toppled the USSR’s squad at the Lake Placid games. The film, which features newly unearthed footage, should get even hockey novices to consider watching when the games kick off next weekend.
Story by Sean Collier
Photo Courtesy of 20th Century Studios’ Send Help
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