De Lift
| De Lift | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Directed by | Dick Maas |
| Produced by | Matthijs van Heijningen |
| Written by | Dick Maas |
| Starring |
Huub Stapel Willeke van Ammelrooy Josine van Dalsum |
| Music by | Dick Maas |
| Cinematography | Marc Felperlaan |
| Edited by | Hans van Dongen |
| Distributed by | Tuschinski Film Distribution |
|
Release date
|
|
|
Running time
|
95 min. (Dutch cut) |
| Country | Netherlands |
| Language | Dutch |
De Lift (released in North America as The Lift) is a 1983 Dutch science-fiction horror film directed and written by Dick Maas. The plot concerns an mysteriously intelligent elevator that begins a murderous spree to those who dare go near the elevator or use it.
In 2001, an American remake titled Down was released and also directed by Dick Maas.
In a building in Amsterdam, an elevator inexplicably begins to function alone. After a lightning storm causes a power failure and traps four people in the elevator, the elevator will not open after even after a subsequent power restore and the passengers almost suffocate. Soon, subsequent malfunctions prove fatal as an elderly blind man falls to his death when the elevator doors open to an empty shaft, the building night watchman is decapitated by the elevator doors, and a janitor is snared in the shaft in which his body drops through the elevator ceiling hatch.
Felix Adelaar (Huub Stapel), a technician from the elevator company Deta Liften, begins to examine the electrical system in an attempt to find any anomalies. During the course of several inspections, he meets Mieke de Boer (Willeke van Ammelrooy), a journalist for De Nieuwe Revu, a local tabloid that Felix remarks he often finds in his friends' cat litter. When inspections reveal no apparent problems with the electrical system, Felix becomes obsessed with the continuing malfunctions of the elevator, not even taking time with his wife Saskia (Josine van Dalsum) and their mutual friends. While Saskia begins to have suspicions, he continues his investigation by examining the manuals with wiring diagrams. When Felix pays yet another visit to the building, he notices outside a van for Rising Sun, a manufacturer of microprocessors for automation and a secret supplier of experimental microprocessors to Deta Liften. Felix and Mieke, after collection newspaper article archives about Rising Sun, try to meet up with the company's CEO, but the CEO begins to act nervous and answers abruptly.
Saskia finds out about his recent activity and angrily confronts him at diner, but their argument is interrupted by a call from Mieke who invites Felix to meet up with her former university professor who specializes in electronics. The professor explains microprocessors' sensitivity to external factors, such as electric fields, magnetic fields, and radioactivity, which undermine the proper functionality and tells about a computer built years ago which had suddenly begun to self-program and went out of control.
The next morning, Felix is summoned to the elevator factory by his boss who angrily suspends him for his unauthorized visit to Rising Sun. That evening, the owners of Deta Liften and Rising Sun have a meeting inside a car, and reveal that the elevator's controller, made out of organic material, is going rogue by killing people in which makes them nervous.
...
Wikipedia