The Lift (1983)
Directed by Dick Maas
A killer elevator movie. Thats what it is, and wait theres more than one killer elevator movie? Both by the same director? Weird! After watching Amsterdamned and really enjoying it, I decided to watch another Dick Maas movie, and I’ve heard good things about The Lift, so here we go.
The Lift is about a high rise office building with brand new, state of the art elevators. Soon they start malfunctioning, injuring and killing people. It is up to an elevator repair tech and a news reporter to figure out what is going on, and save any future victims. Now you think a movie about a killer elevator would be rather dumb, but man this movie is pretty good. It is shot beautifully and acted well. The suspense builds as the movie goes on, and my only real beef is the movie ends rather abruptly.
The acting is actually reall good in this. Huub Stapel from Amsterdamned plays the main character, Felix the lift technician. His complete and utter fascination with the issue of the high rise elevator causes lots of trouble in his life, such as his wife and kids leaving him, ouch. Huub is really likable and gives such great emotion in this, just like Amsterdamned. The special effects are pretty solid, as you can see in some of the kills. The most impressive kill is when a night watchmen gets his head ripped off by the elevator, that made me applaud haha.
If you have not seen this movie, you should check it out. It is currently streaming on Shudder and definitely worth your time. I mentioned earlier that there are two killer elevator movies, both of which are directed by Maas, the other is called Down, which many consider a remake of the Lift. I have yet to watch that. The Lift I give a B+, check it out!
