Dark Floors

Well, the movie itself, the place and the atmosphere did actually have the potential to be more successful and enjoyable. But the way things happened during the story made it a lil bit disappointing.

Lordi was a major hype and revelation in 2007 because they won the Eurovision Song Contest with a (not-so-heavy) metal song called "Hard Rock Hallelujah" and appeared on stage dressed like hideous monsters. But, let's face it, their victory most likely had very little to do with their great musical talents. The Eurovision contest gradually turned into one big political circus over the years and Lordi probably just won because their song finally brought a little change and – even more importantly - because their whole act sort of ingeniously spoofed the whole annual event. The absolute last thing Lordi's first (and hopefully last) horror film brings is change and ingenuity. "Dark Floors", based on an idea of the lead singer and starring the rest of the band in supportive roles, is a truly unimaginative and hopeless accumulation of clichés. The immense budget ("Dark Floors" supposedly is the most expensive Finnish film ever) definitely assures greatly macabre set pieces and impressive make-up art, but what's the point where there's no story that is worth telling? The film takes is set in a busy hospital where a bunch of people, among them a father and his young daughter with an unidentifiable illness, become trapped in the elevator during a power breakdown. When the doors open again, the floors are empty and it looks as if the hospital lies abandoned since many years already. Trying to reach the exit, the group stumbles upon several morbid and inexplicable obstacles, like eyeless corpses, screaming ghosts and Heavy Metal monsters emerging from the floors. The only three points I'm handing out to "Dark Floors" are exclusively intended for the scenery and the adequate tension building during the first half of the film. For as long as the sinister events don't require an explanation, the atmosphere is quite creepy, but as soon as you realize the explanation will a) be very stupid or b) never come, the wholesome just collapses like an unstable house of cards. Lordi's costumes never really were scary to begin with (except maybe to traditional Eurovision fans) and, in combination with a story more reminiscent to Asian ghost-horror, they just look downright pathetic and misfit. With all the national myths and truly unique exterior filming locations, I personally always presumed Finland – The Land of a Thousand Lakes – would be the ideal breeding ground for potentially horrific horror tales, but I guess that's another disillusion on my account.

While in the hospital for a tomography of the brain of his autistic daughter Sarah (Skye Bennett), Ben (Noah Huntley) becomes upset when there is a power failure. He decides to leave the hospital with Sarah, while the nurse Emily (Dominique McElligott) tries to convince him to leave Sarah for further treatment. They get the elevator with three other passengers, and suddenly the elevator stops; when the door opens, people has vanished from the hospital, the environment is creepy and they are chased by devilish monsters. They find that they are trapped in the hospital, and the creatures seem to be hunting Sarah.

"Dark Floors" is a bizarre and weird trip to a disturbed mind of an autistic girl. The dark story is intriguing and has a promising beginning, but the conclusion is disappointing. The performance of Skye Bennett, the eerie atmosphere and the special effects are the plus of this movie; Emily is a nice character well performed by Dominique McElligott; however, it is impossible to feel any empathy for the lead and important character performed by Noah Huntley. My vote is five.

Title (Brazil): "Alma Diabólica" ("Devilish Soul")

A few days ago I stumbled over Dark Floors: the story is rather predictable and a little nonsensical at the same time, but the atmosphere, the visuals and the settings are done right. What surprised me - in a negative way - is the soundtrack, as the movie is a project of the Finnish heavy metal band Lordi it is really surprising that the soundtrack is a weak point of Dark Floors, many background tracks are really rather distracting, cliched and badly composed, and do not support the scenes well. Anyway, verdict: all in all okay.

Just finished watching, can't say I was impressed.

It starts of quite good, the visual and the atmosphere gives a creepy feeling as this type of movie should. But it all ends when the first lordi monster appears. Not only do you recognize them from the band lordi, but they are seriously malplaced in the movie. Doomsday monsters with leather jackets and piercings are so 80's.

As for the storyline, it starts of as similar horror movies, people trapped inside a hell hole. But there is no clear story on why and what is happening. The viewer is thrown some lines on possible reasons, but the lines never meet and end up to anything but a mess.

With all the money spent on this film, with an intriguing start and some good effects, I had thought someone would have taken better care of the product. I wonder if lordi made this movie just to prove that their show costumes could be scary (except they aren't).

So the movie gets cred for the visuals, i guess the money had to go somewhere. But the rest is an embarrassing attempt from a rock band to make their on-stage monster aliases scarier.