As much as we all like the SPIDER-MAN movies (excluding the third), what we've really been waiting for is another wild, anything goes, over-the-top horror flick from the man who introduced us to the Boomstick and made us cheer for a guy beating the crap out of his own hand. After a baseball movie (FOR THE LOVE OF THE GAME), a few thrillers (A SIMPLE PLAN, THE GIFT) and the never ending SPIDEY series, such a return to those horror origins seemed unlikely, despite almost two decades of fan pleas for EVIL DEAD 4.

DRAG ME TO HELL may not be ED4, but hey, we'll take what we can get. Arguably the most closely-connected material to early Raimi work from the director since 1995's THE QUICK AND THE DEAD, DRAG ME has already been called a return to old school Raimi and received strong praise from test screenings. Our own MrDisgusting recently called it "quite simply the most PERFECT horror film I've seen in a long, long while."

As we discussed in PART ONE of our visit to the set of DRAG ME TO HELL, Bloody-Disgusting had the chance to spend a day on the set last summer during the shooting of a climactic seance scene at the house of Shaun San Dena (Adriana Barraza). During the visit we observed shooting and spoke to the cast and crew. We also got some time to hang with Mr. Raimi himself, still wearing his trademark suit but toned down a bit by a black T-shirt under his sport coat rather than the usual dress shirt and tie. The look is further evidence of Raimi's laid back attitude on set, a likely reprieve from the big budget pressures of the SPIDER-MAN series.

"I forgot how much I missed it," Raimi tells press. "It's a tremendous amount of fun."

Initially, Raimi wasn't even going to direct DRAG ME after offering the script (co-written with brother Ivan) as material for his Ghost House Pictures banner. "When I wanted to produce it, I couldn't get the amount of money I needed with the director I had," says Raimi. "Then the question came, 'Okay Sam, can you cut the script down so we can make it for the amount we can get?' But when it came to cutting it down, I thought, 'That's not really why I'm making this movie. I want to make THIS movie.'"

"I was working on a small drama and it needed some work on the script. There was an impending writer's strike and the only script that I had that I really wanted to make was DRAG ME TO HELL. It was something that I really took up with great relish."

DRAG ME was first conceived as a side project for Sam and Ivan during writing sessions for DARKMAN in the late '80s. "When we were kind of burned out on a Darkman writing session, we would work on this. And when he would visit me in L.A. we would bring it out again. At that time it was more of a short story. We finished a first draft of it in 1989, 1990. We started to work on a screenplay version of it I think about 1994 or 1995. My brother and I wanted to write a story about a woman that makes a sinful decision and ends up paying the price for it. Or not, if she ends up escaping the thing. We really liked it."

But as Raimi's directing career in Hollywood started to take off, the project got put on the back burner for other projects followed by the unlikely offer to helm a story about everyone's favorite neighborhood webslinger. "When we finished our draft, I started to have really good access to written material," says Raimi. "I had the chance to read Scott Smith's SIMPLE PLAN and I had the chance to work with him as a screenwriter, so I jumped at the chance. After that I kept finding screenplays that I really loved - FOR THE LOVE OF THE GAME, THE GIFT... After that I had the opportunity to make the SPIDER-MAN movie, which I didn't want to turn down. So I didn't exactly drag it out of the closet, I just had such fine material I didn't want to turn my back to."

Despite 16 years in between ARMY OF DARKNESS and DRAG ME, Raimi had no trouble returning to his old tricks. "It's got a lot of fun stuff in it," says an enthusiastic Raimi. "An old witch-like hag and stuff that I enjoy in horror pictures. I love not having that pressure on you. It's great working with actors and technicians and directors of photography, Peter Demme in this case, who really want to just craft the shots to build suspense and deliver a scare."

Although Raimi got a taste of CG work on the SPIDER-MAN series, he says that he doesn't believe in using the process unless it's the only option. "SPIDER-MAN needed that tool to pull off the illusion of the main character and for it to believable. It's not really my interest to work in CG. It was just the most effective tool to bring about the illusion that Spider-Man could really exist in our world."

DRAG ME keeps the CG to a minimum, instead employing the practical work of Raimi's early work courtesy of Greg Nicotero and KNB. "It's great working with [those guys] where the effects are, 'Let's gross 'em out!' or 'Let's deliver this shot.' It's simpler and fun. It's a little cruder, but I'm really enjoying myself. I'm hoping that the audience will enjoy it to."

Raimi will be returning to the SPIDEY series for Part 4 next, but hopefully this taste of his horror origins will mean its not another 16 years before the next one. "I feel more relaxed doing it," admits Raimi. "Less panicked. Certainly this is much easier than the first EVIL DEAD movie. This is fun and we can work from a place of experience. There's still a lot we're discovering."

"I'm just trying to make a horror movie that people go to, they laugh at, they think is suspenseful," says Raimi. "[I want them to] get excited about in the action or monster sequences and have those types of fun house reactions."

Click here for PART ONE of our DRAG ME TO HELL Set Visit where we witness Sam Raimi's latest filming first hand!

Drag Me to Hell hits theaters May 29 from Universal Pictures.