O Elevador Assassino

I first saw this in the late 80s on a vhs. Revisited it recently. I found the movie very surrealistic then and aft revisiting, i found it to be far ahead of its time regarding machines taking control.

After an elevator mysteriously begins to function intelligently on its own and kill people, a technician from the elevator company becomes obsessed and begins to examine the electrical system in an attempt to find the malfunctions of the elevator thereby impacting his marital life.

While the film doesn't have any gory kills except for the decapitation one. It has less body count but certain amount of tension is maintained especially when the lil girl goes closer to the lift and during the climax when Felix takes matters into his own hands.

I agree with John Hartl's review about the quality of this movie. It could easily have been silly, but it definitely is not. The last part, with Felix lit only by his industrial hand lamp in the enemy's own domain, is completely engrossing. The - quite sparse - music is eerily effective and the photography very good, as are the performances. In the version I saw, the dubbing is well done and convincing. Another winner from the Netherlands. About time we high risers took the lift seriously!

In a high rise office building in the Netherlands, an elevator repairman named Felix Adelaar (Huub Stapel) is busy trying to solve a mystery. The elevators in this place are now functioning improperly, incapacitating passengers if not killing them outright. Could the cause be some sort of human error, or is something supernatural going on? Felix works the clues in the company of an aggressive, sassy reporter, Mieke de Beer (Willeke van Ammelrooy).

Writer & director Dick Maas ("Amsterdamned") deserves some credit for treating his premise with some measure of restraint. Therefore, it won't be to all tastes. It admittedly comes up a little short in the thrills department, with a slow pace and a talky script. Yet, there are fun moments, such as when an unfortunate security guard is decapitated by an elevator. Also, Stapel is an appealing working-class, Everyman sort of hero, and he has some chemistry with the striking van Ammelrooy. They receive able support from players such as Josine van Dalsum (as Felix's wife), Siem Vroom (as a police inspector), and Hans Veerman (as the boss at "Rising Sun", the electronics company working in tandem with Felix's employers).

The script does possess some passing interest for the way that it touches upon the subject of technological evolution (with computers that used to fill up entire rooms now becoming much more compact, and the advent of computer chips).

"The Lift" is a little light on gore and other exploitable elements, but overall it's fairly entertaining to watch. Maas does pretty well working with the limited budget, and IS expert at crafting suspense, especially the eerie and atmospheric finale with Felix in an elevator shaft. The electronic score (composed by Maas) is likewise a highlight.

One of the set decorators is Matthijs van Heijningen Jr., who 28 years later, directed the prequel to John Carpenters' "The Thing".

Seven out of 10.

A new lift has been installed recently. A few people get stuck in it. A few days later, a blind man falls into the shaft. A guard is beheaded by the same lift. 'What we have here is a killing machine...!'

Director Dick Maas is a big fan of Steven Spielbergs films (same here, but only his earlier movies). 'De Lift', describable as another alternative for the JAWS-formula, makes clear that Dick Maas lacks a lot in comparison to the most successful Hollywood-director.

The movie has a few good scenes which are shocking, but the majority of the movie is surprisingly dull and tedious. As long as the story keeps to the elevator, it's OK. However, there are a lot of scenes about family problems and interminable discussions about elevators. Those do not build up tension, they're just very, very boring and though I am not much of a sadist, I only kept watching because I was anxiously waiting for the next person to be killed by the lift. In a very cruel way of course. One should not watch this movie for the story-line in the first place. The plot doesn't make ANY sense: how would you explain a killer lift? Anyhow, there IS some kind of explanation in the movie, but only kids under 8 years old would believe that nonsense. Under 8, for I watched this movie first when I was 7 years old and I was scared to death. Perhaps I am too old for this movie now..

What do you get when a new elevator is installed and the evil of Stephen King's Christine? You get...THE LIFT. Dick Maas directed a stylish thriller about an elevator with malicious tones. Try suffocation, a blind man falling down the shaft (nice sound FX for this scene) and the famous decapitation scene. My friend was grossed out after seeing the decapitation scene. Nevertheless, it is up to our hero Felix (Huub Stapel) to find out what is wrong with the lift. After seeing this, I want to check out the 2001 remake DOWN, also directed by Maas with James Marshall in the role of the maintenance man in search of the lift's problems.