When the expectations of a movie are not that high and it ends up being terrible, you didn’t lose anything except some time in your day. But when expectations are low and the movie ends up being better than you thought, you leave surprised and maybe even a little impressed. Do not get me wrong, Devil is not an impressive achievement in movie-making, however, it does have suspense, the acting is not terrible, and there is even a twist at the end. Some may see it coming, but still, that doesn’t make it a bad one.
Devil is the first installment of “The Night Chronicles,” which comes from the mind of M. Night Shyamalan. He comes up with the story while some one else writes and directs it. Director John Erick Dowdle (Quarantine) takes on this movie and does a nice job with it considering the material. What can you do with a movie that is about meeting the devil in an elevator?
Five strangers who all have secrets get on an elevator and when it gets stuck, horrible things begin to occur. Every time the lights go off, there is screaming and crying and when the lights come back on, someone has been hurt or killed. While these five people are trying to figure out who is who, there is a rescue team and a detective trying to get them out while investigating and deciding which one of them could be the killer.
The concept for this movie is interesting and playing with the devil being human and being stuck with him could be scary depending on your beliefs. Not to mention, there are people in the world who just hate elevators in general. So there is a lot here to make Devil appealing to horror fans. I really don’t consider this a horror movie, though. It is more suspenseful than downright frightening, and the director hides the brutality of the killings, only showing the aftermath, which is a nice touch.
But it could be smarter and more appealing if the script was better and if there was an A-list star to bring more credit to the movie. We know what Devil is serving up, and it is up to us to decide if we want to eat it or not. Most of the people who decide to go won’t leave disappointed.
M. Night Shyamalan has had a rough couple of years and maybe there is a light at the end of the tunnel. I don’t know if Devil is that light, though, because M. Night is capable of so much more. He wrote, produced, and directed The Sixth Sense! He can be better than this, but perhaps he is moving back in the right direction.
Devil is good because it could have been so much worse.
We have an episode on M. Night Shyamalan in the Vick’s Flicks Podcast archives. You can listen to that one HERE:
Listen to “Ep. 21: M. Night Shyamalan” on Spreaker.Brandon Vick is a member of The Music City Film Critics’ Association, the resident film critic of the SoBros Network, and the star of The Vick’s Flicks Podcast. Follow him on Twitter @SirBrandonV and be sure to search #VicksFlicks for all of his latest movie reviews.
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