Down the Shaft

 

Timing can often make or break a film's success. That would be especially true if your film was about an attack on a New York city skyscraper scheduled for a 2001 release.

Quick Plot: Welcome to the Millennium Building, 102 floors of thriving activity located in the heart of the big apple. After a bolt of lightning strikes while the bottom barrel security team is on guard, the building's 73 elevators begin acting a bit funny

There are minor inconveniences at first: a maternity workout group gets trapped, resulting in a few early deliveries but no injuries. A rogue rollerblader is sucked into the maintenance elevator via the parking lot and exits on the top floor with a bang, shooting straight out and 100 floors to his death. And of course, a blind man with a bad haircut is lured down the shaft after his seeing eye dog. 

The building's management, played with appropriate Mr. Rich stiffness by the late Edward Hermann, is able to cover much of it up, especially since Ron Perlman's elevator repair company is willing to play along. Rogue rookie mechanic Mark (Twin Peaks' James Marshall) however, knows something is amiss, as does plucky reporter Jennifer Evans, played by pre-Mulholland Drive, post-Children of the Corn IV era Naomi Watts with a New York accent that gave me hives. All that and I haven't even mentioned my boyfriend Michael Ironside stopping by as a maybe evil German scientist.

There is a LOT going on here, and most of it is fairly terrible. Writer/director Dick Maas was remaking his own 1983 film, a movie I apparently watched just four years ago and remember next to nothing about it. Down, also titled The Shaft, will probably linger a little longer in my head for two reasons: its extremely bad pre-9/11 timing, and the fact that it employed so many treasured character actors.

A lot of them are (thankfully) having fun. Unfortunately, it's pretty unclear whether that's what they're supposed to be doing. The tone is a mess, which means the prevailing note is what takes over...and that is basically "dumb." This is the kind of movie where Naomi Watts has to scream fake rape accusations and terrorist threats to get ahead, and I honestly can't tell if the movie thinks it's funny or horrible. 

For the film's first half hour or so, I was amused with the same level of chuckles that a better-than-average Asylum Studio flick can pull. But folks, this movie runs close to two hours which ultimately feels like a violation of the Patriot Act. 

High Points

I'll never argue with a concept as glorious as "killer elevator" and thankfully, for as messy as Down is, it does have a fair amount of fun 

Low Points

I once entered an elevator in a women's hospital along with a single (very) pregnant woman. It was just the two of us and as soon as the door closed, the lights went off. For about two seconds, I realized a terrifying, exciting truth: I would have to deliver a baby. Every sitcom and Beverly Hills 90210 episode I ever watched was leading to this very moment. By the third second, the lights were back and we safely reached the ground floor, crisis/hero moment averted.

I bring this up to say, how dare a movie include a scene where a batch of heavily pregnant women are trapped in a corrupt elevator only to not give us an actual birth scene

Lessons Learned

Nobody moves up in the world faster than an elevator operator

In the scheme of things, decapitations really don't happen that often

When your career takes a downturn, your alma mater may downgrade your status from "Harvard alum" to "former Harvard graduate"

Rent/Bury/Buy

It's hard NOT to recommend the star-studded evil fake New York skyscraper elevator movie because unfortunately, we just don't get nearly enough star-studded evil fake New York skyscraper elevator movies. I THINK I enjoyed this one more than Dick Maas's original, but how much of that was its quality and how much was my glee at the very hint of a Michael Ironside appearance. This could probably make a fun drinks-with-friends kind of watch, as its goofiness requires a certain kind of audience energy in order to work for the ridiculously long runtime.   

Ron Perlman Saves Your Soul

If there’s one thing I’ve learned from both Days of Our Lives and Children of the Corn(s), it’s that no filmmaker should ever, ever never ever, and did I mention never? expect that the computer generated deep demon voice is effective at doing anything other than making an audience giggle like schoolgirls.

Catholic schoolgirls, in fact...

Quick Plot: A pious and pretty nun-watched student sketches cartoons based on Revelations, only to then be sucked up by a demon as priest Ron Perlman (!!!) looks on helplessly. 

I don’t know about you, but you can bet your SAMCRO leather jacket that I’m not putting my faith in a church headed by Hellboy.

Flash forward some years to the present day, where a batch of bad girl teens with fabulous hair are sent to the now empty boarding school. What kind of parents would send their children to an academy with a sordid history of lost students and, more importantly, two faculty members and FOUR OTHER STUDENTS is its own question, but eh, here we are so let’s make the best of it.

Amongst the ‘delinquents’ are Alex, a telekinetic blond, Mara, a sassy lesbian who keeps doing cute things like pretending she might rape you, Cecilia, a blind anarchist with a nose ring, Lea, an overly nice girl who sleeps in ugly pajamas, and Connie, an airhead Wiccan. After a few rounds of pseudo-threatening behavior, the girls discover they all have unique supernatural powers (healing, ESP, shiny hair) which should come in handy as the abandoned school is clearly harnessing some angsty mojo leftover by Father Hellboy’s favorite disappeared student.

5ive Girls is an odd little movie, one that could play to an older or younger audience if it knew itself better. With a primarily teenage cast and a hearty dose of CW-ready music, the film could easily have been marketed a to teenage girls a la The Craft. On the other side, a few more strokes of maturity (you already have attractive young lesbians in schoolgirl uniforms) and you have a sleazy something for adult viewers. But for whatever reason, 5ive Girls doesn’t play either hand with any commitment. 

Tamest sapphic smooch since Britney & Madonna

In a similar vein to Lucky McKee’s okay, not great The Woods, 5ive Girls just sort of moseys along with moments of interest and more moments of eye rolls. The young cast does its best, but none really elevate any of the material to anything Gossip Girl couldn’t do better. Worst of all is the total waste of Ron Perlman in the role of a conflicted? maybe? sort of? or just not? priest. The story itself is simple but fine (something about possession, sacrifice, witchcraft, and deep-voiced demons) but sadly music video director Warren P. Sonoda never seems fully aware of who’s watching.

High Points

I won’t spoil anything, but the ending was far darker than I expected to find in what could almost have been a lightweight PG13 rated horror film

Low Points

Hopefully, the world will one day look back upon the early twentieth century and say “Whatever was our ancestors thinking to believe titling films with numbers that kind of look like letters made any sense?” Seriously, if this trend of ScreFourem and Fiveive Girls catches on, I may need to seek solace on Mars

Lessons Learned

There’s a huge difference between a witch, bitch, head mistress and anarchist

A great way to distract a priest is to ask him about Latin verb conjugation

Bitches always keep their mothers’ maiden names

Credits Curiosity

The opening credits feature Ron Perlman reading scripture in an odd rhythm as a techno beat mixes it up as to sound like a rap. I don’t know what they were going for, but let’s call it awesome

Rent/Bury/Buy

5ive Girls isn’t awful, but its audiences aren’t me...mostly because they’re either 13 year old girls looking for something to program at a slumber party or older gents who get a kick out of girls in knee socks and collared shirts. Sadly for both demographics, the film doesn’t really care to fully please either audience, but there’s still some odd fun to be found in watching Ron Perlman explain Latin grammar or the continuously not good actress from Diary of the Dead summoning Legion himself to possess a bunch of cute twentysomethings playing fifteen year old girls. It’s a mediocre Instant Watch, and one that’s fitting when you’re in the mood for a female-centered boarding school movie that’s a little less good than The Woods.