Stylish, gory, but very confusing
Sequel in name only to the Japanese torture/splatter pic Evil Dead Trap (1988) (so, again, not in any way connected with Sam Raimi's Evil Dead movies). Like the first, this plays out like a combination of slasher, giallo, and body-horror.
Aki works as a theatre projectionist. She's overweight, not 'conventionally attractive', suffers from low self-esteem, and pretty much withdraws from the world when she's not working. Her only friend is Emi; she's an attractive former pop idol, now working as a TV news reporter. Emi has been covering a series of brutal ripper-style murders of young women. Our sympathies for Aki fade when she suddenly realises that she herself is the killer; some evenings she dresses fashionably - even seductively, and stalks and kills young women, mutilating then in a manner similar to Jack the Ripper. That's all I can say with any certainty, because from then on it's by no means clear how much - if any - of what we see is real... Aki is encouraged by Emi to get out more, and they get into a bizarre love-triangle with Emi's (married) supervisor. Emi gets sexually aroused by the sight of the women's mutilated bodies as she arrives at crime scenes. Aki is haunted by the ghost of a young boy (kind of a forerunner of 'Toshio' from the Ju-On movies), and that same little boy also appears to Emi's supervisor and his wife as the spirit of a child they longed for but never had (???). Gradually, jealousies and rivalries begin to alter Aki and Emi's relationship, leading to an even more bizarre - and incredibly bloody - turn of events.
The movie has been called 'hallucinatory', which is a perfect description. What's certain is that the cinematography is terrific, the performances are all very good, the effects are excellent, and the blood and gore rivals that of the Terrifier movies. Like the first one, visually and musically it's got a very Argento feel to it, with a bit of Cronenberg thrown in. There are two big drawbacks. One is that the whole thing is just so damn confusing; it's hard to get invested in what's happening to the characters when you don't know how much of it is 'real'. The other is that the first half of the movie is painfully slow - thankfully, things pick up. In fact, where I found the first EDT great APART from the climax, with EDT2 it's the other way around; the climax (which lasts about 20 minutes) is a jaw-dropping bloodbath and easily the best part of the movie.
What's great is great, but overall, 6.5/10