365 Movies #157 "Devil"

Wow. Did Hollywood really make a movie that could totally work as a low-budget indy? Yep, they totally did. Of course, with M. Night Shyamalan as Producer/writer it's not surprising. Hey! Lay off. I forgive him for "The Happening" and I actually enjoyed everything else he's done (YES, I liked "Lady in the Water"). Shyamalan's last film to hit the blog was one of his firsts with "WIDE AWAKE". This one is more in line with his usual heady horror film.

Basically, 5 people are stuck in an elevator together (very well explained). One of them is the devil and only the devil makes it out alive, but who is it? Our five captives are played by Geoffrey Arend (yes he is the "The snozzberries taste like snozzberries." guy from "Super Troopers"), Bokeem Woodbine ("BLACK DYNAMITE"), Bojana Novakovic ("Edge of Darkness", "Drag Me to Hell"), Jenny O'Hara ("Mystic River", "Matchstick Men") and Logan Marshall-Green ("The OC" and Scott's eagerly awaited "Prometheus"). Chris Messina plays Detective Bowden, a man with a haunted past who, while investigating a suicide is thrown into the middle of the devil's game. Jacob Vargas (the guy with the bulletproof coat in "Traffic") plays our narrator and religious security guard who is wise to what's happening.

The story is well developed, with good twists and turns. With most of the film taking place in an elevator, it's neat to see them pull of the horror/suspense element. It's not as earth shattering (no pun intended) as "BURIED" in that regard, but it's pretty cool. Another familiar faces to the blog is Joe Cobden. He played Dwight, the building maintenance guy in this film and was a cop in "BLINDNESS".

Director John Erick Dowdle was also responsible for "Quarantine" and "The Poughkeepsie Tapes". I've yet to see either, but after this, I'll have to look them up.

DEVIL ON IMDB