According to legend, the Devil from time-to-time takes on human form, gathering a group of people he wishes to torment, trapping them, and hiding amongst them, posing as one of them.
Stranded in a broken down elevator, 5 strangers are about to find out that some legends are true...
I do love a claustrophobic film, and 5 people in an elevator certainly delivers on that front; combined with the idea that one of their ever decreasing number is a killer (Satan himself, no less) there's no shortage of tension, and the movie does a great job of keeping you guessing, right down to the end. As with all good whodunnits, you'll suspect each and every cast member at some point or another in the movies runtime.
To keep things from getting tedious, and to remove unanswered questions about how someone can spend any amount of time killing people in an elevator in a modern building without a rescue being launched, the film also checks in regularly with the building's staff, and the police officer running the investigation.
Fault wise, there's a couple of things that stop this movie being an instant classic; cellphones (as is so often the case in horror movies) would solve one of the major problems facing our group in a heartbeat, so having them show up late in the film (to be used only as torches) really grated on me; also, early scenes set up Detective Bowden (our man on the outside) as a hell of a detective; solving in seconds a reasonably complex case of a seemingly impossible suicide, and it's a shame that his intuition never really comes into play again... Not a plot hole as such, but a wasted opportunity.
The movie's (lack of) budget is apparent, particularly in some run-of-the-mill performances, and a religious security guard who happens to be the one man on earth who's mother was obsessed with the legend of the devil trapping the damned to torment them on earth is a little too convenient and exposition-y.
All that said, it's a fun movie which will keep you guessing for an hour and a half, and not leave you feeling disappointed, or that you gave wasted your time.
Worth a watch if you come across it for free or cheap, I'm glad I saw this movie, but I wouldn't recommend you go out of your way to track it down.
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