Samuel Marshall "Sam" Raimi (born October 23, 1959) is an American film director, producer, actor and writer. He is best known for directing cult horror films like the Evil Dead series and Drag Me To Hell as well as the blockbuster Spider-Man films.

Raimi, the fourth of five children, was born in Royal Oak, Michigan, and grew up in Birmingham, Michigan. He is the son of Celia Barbara (née Abrams), who owned lingerie shops, and Leonard Ronald Raimi, who owned home furnishing stores. Raimi was raised in Conservative Judaism; his ancestors immigrated from Russia and Hungary. Raimi's eldest sibling, Sander, died in a swimming accident in 1968 at age fifteen. His elder brother, Ivan Raimi, is an emergency room doctor and screenwriter who sometimes collaborates with Sam. His brother, Ted Raimi, is an actor and played J. Jonah Jameson's assistant Hoffman in all three Spider-Man movies. His older sister, Andrea Raimi Rubin, is a stenographer and is not involved in the film industry. Raimi attended Wylie E. Groves High School, and Michigan State University and majored in English, leaving after three semesters to film The Evil Dead.

Raimi became fascinated with making films when his father brought a movie camera home one day and he began to make Super 8 movies with childhood friend Bruce Campbell. In college, he teamed up with his brother's roommate Robert Tapert and Campbell to shoot Within the Woods (1978), a 32-minute horror film which raised $350,000, as well as the short comedic film It's Murder!. Through family, friends, and a network of investors Raimi was able to finance production of the highly successful horror film The Evil Dead (1981) which became a cult hit and effectively launched Raimi's career. He began work on his second film Crimewave (1985), intended as a live-action comic book—the film was not successful, due in part to unwanted studio intervention. Raimi returned to the horror genre with the seminal Evil Dead II (which toned down the savageness of the original in favour of slapstick, showcasing his love of the Three Stooges). A long-time comic book buff, he attempted to adapt "The Shadow" into a movie, but was unable to secure the rights, so he created his own super-hero, Darkman (1990). The film was his first major studio picture, and was only moderately successful, but he was still able to secure funding for Evil Dead III: Army of Darkness, which turned away almost totally from horror in favor of fantasy and comedy elements.