With his name tarnished by a string of badly-reviewed and poor-performing movies, M. Night Shyamalan is taking a back seat for a trilogy of movies called The Night Chronicles. He comes up with the stories and produces, but allows others to write and direct.Devil is the first entry in this series, and it looks like this could be a career-saving move for Shyamalan.
The premise is pretty straightforward, but the approach and the execution are enough to make this movie stand out. Five strangers find themselves trapped in an elevator, and there's reason to believe that the devil is among them. We know this because of narration supplied by Ramirez (Jacob Vargas), a stock character of the "superstitious Hispanic" variety. He shares a story his mother used to tell him about the Devil's Meeting—a South American legend of the devil coming to collect souls of the wicked in a manner designed to teach a lesson to more than just his victims.
The five are the expected demographic cross-section: a large black security guard (Bokeem Woodbine), a sleazy Pakistani salesman (Geoffrey Arend), an old lady (Jenny O'Hara), a cute chick (Bojana Novakovic), and a white guy (Logan Marshall-Green). They all seem like they have something to hide. As if being trapped together in an elevator weren't enough to test their patience with each other, they start to die one by one in mysterious ways.
Desperately trying to save these people, and to figure out what the hell's going on, is a security guard (Matt Craven) in a helpless situation. When Detective Bowden (Chris Messina) of the Philly PD comes to take over the situation, it's not much relief. He hands out orders and gives an air of being in control, but he also has his own demons to contend with, as is required by the Movie Cop Rule Book.
Discussing any more about what happens would spoil the fun, and I certainly wouldn't want to do that, because Devil is a lot of fun. Brian Nelson's screenplay is clever and original. He resorts to the typical cliches only when avoiding them would just bog down the movie. His telling of Shyamalan's story is tight and fast-paced, but it's not non-stop; he knows when to allow a joke here and there, when to slow things down, and when to pull the floor out from under you.
John Erick Dowdle's direction is equally impressive. He establishes two distinct feels to this movie, and the contrast is extremely effective. When seeing what's happening in the elevator, we feel like we're one of the people trapped there. Often times we get a subjective perspective, but not exclusively from the point of view of the same character; we don't know who we're rooting for and who we should be weary of, because Dowdle shows us all five sides of the story firsthand. By contrast, when we're outside of the elevator, seeing the security camera view from within the control room or watching Detective Bowden race throughout the building as he pieces the story together, there's a freeing sense of openness that only reinforces how claustrophobic the cramped elevator is. They're sitting ducks in there, and they and we all know it.
I was especially struck by the camera work, which aids in this effect thematically, but is also technically amazing. There's a mirror in the back of the elevator which must've been the bane of cinematographer Tak Fujimoto's existence while shooting, and yet it's used to great effect—in more ways than one. Dowdle makes good use of the Philadelphia skyscrapers of Devil's downtown setting, almost fetishizing them to a point, again giving us a taste of the outside and a sense of sprawl before thrusting us back into the enclosed elevator once again.
Like pretty much all horror movies—especially those with a religious basis, which is most of them—this is a morality tale at its heart. As Ramirez keeps reminding us, the devil comes for those who have done wrong, not just to punish them for their deeds but to remind the rest of us what's in store if we follow a similar path. But then again, for most of the movie we're not sure if it's actually the devil at work in that elevator or not; maybe there's an explanation for it all, and Bowden is just the sleuth to find it. Or maybe he'll become a believer himself (according to that same Movie Cop Rule Book, he also must be a steadfast skeptic, and so Bowden is). The main cast all does great work, each convincing us that we shouldn't be convinced of his or her character's innocence or guilt until the last moment. Chris Messina runs the show, though; not only is his character in charge of the situation, but his performance ties everything together as well. I really liked the interplay of Logan Marshall-Green and Bojana Novakovic as two of the trapped five, too. You'll see what I mean.
No comments:
Post a Comment