O Elevador Assassino

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..

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!

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.

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 that the movie does have a lot of flaws, but considering the fact that it is impossible to make high budget movies in Holland (Paul Verhoeve could never have made a movie like Robocop in Holland!) and considering how old the movie is, it's a quite decent movie.

There are enough American movies in English which are far worse.