In 1979, a group of college students find a Sumerian Book of the Dead in an old wilderness cabin they've rented for a weekend getaway.

Ash Williams and his girlfriend Linda find a log cabin in the woods with a voice recording from an archeologist who had recorded himself reciting ancient chants from "The Book of the Dead." As they play the recording an evil power is unleashed taking over Linda's body.

Ash, a handsome, shotgun-toting, chainsaw-armed department store clerk, is time warped backwards into England's Dark Ages, where he romances a beauty and faces legions of the undead.