DOWN (2001) (Blue Underground Blu-ray Review)

DOWN (2001)(aka THE SHAFT) 

Limited Edition (3000) DVD/Blu-ray Combo 

Label: Blue Underground
Rating:  R
Duration: 111 Minutes
Audio: English, French: DTS-HD MA Surround 5.1; English, French Dolby Digital Stereo; English, French: Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround EX; English, French Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo with Optional English Subtitles 
Video: 1080p HD Widescreen (2.35:1) 
Director: Dick Maas
Cast: James Marshall, Naomi Watts, Eric Thal, Michael Ironside, Edward Herrmann, Dan Hedaya, Ron Perlman
 

Director Dick Mass directed this American remake of his own film The Lift (1983) in 2001, which was a popular thing to do at the turn of this century, keeping the same basic premise and set-pieces as the original film wherein an evil-sentient elevator begins murdering people  in a busy high rise. The setting is re-located from Amsterdam to New York City, inside the Millennium Building, a fictitious skyscraper standing in for The Empire State Building. The film begins not with horny party-goers having a close call inside the elevator but with a group of very pregnant women trapped between floors and nearly running out of air, two of the women give birth inside the elevator, with a scene of one of the women's water breaking, fluid erupting onto the floor.  

Two repairmen from the METEOR elevator company are called into look into the possibility of a malfunction, we have Jeff (Eric Thal, The Puppet Masters) and Mark (James Marshall, Twin Peaks) who investigate but find no malfunction with any of the mechanical/operating systems. They give the elevator a clean bill of health the staff at the Millennium building resume normal operations, but the killer elevator proceeds kill in short order, including a pervy blind man and his seeing-eye dog, plus a security guard who loses his head. Both of these kills appeared in the original film but are expanded upon here, the decapitation scene is less rubbery looking, though more digital, and the blind guy drags his poor service dog down the shaft with him! 

Elevator technician Mark becomes our main guy this time around, and Naomi Watts (King Kong) play persistent underdog reporter Jennifer Evans, both teaming-up to solve the case, obsessed by the growing body count at the Millennium building. There's also a great cast of side characters played by familiar faces, we have Edward Herrmann (The Lost Boys) as the building manager Mr. Milligan, Dan Hedaya (The Hunger) as Lt. McBain, Ron Perlman (Hellboy) as Mark's boss at METEOR, and Michael Ironside (Scanners) as a creepy German scientist who is behind the evil A.I. that runs the elevators. 

Aside from the aforementioned blind guy and decapitation stuff  Maas also re stages the scene of a young girl playing with her dolly who is nearly killed by the menacing elevator, but adds a fun daycare element to the story with a stern, foul-mouthed nanny named Ilsa, which was fun. Also new is a high body count scene with the floor dropping out of the packed elevator, with people falling to their demise, bouncing off the walls of the shaft, which is rather fantastic and action-packed. Speaking of action, as where the original film featured the repairman facing off against the bio-chip based evil alone this one features an all out tactical response from the NYC S.W.A.T. team, a real amped-up finale that features a stinger missile launcher!

About the only scene that didn't really work for me was that of an annoying rollerblader (is there any other kind?) who gets sucked into the elevator on the bottom floor and projectile vomited onto the top floor observation deck. falling to his death one hundred floors below. The movie clocks in at nearly two hours long, so it takes a while to get going and the pacing if off from time to time, some of the green screen and digital effects leave a bit to be desired too, but overall if you liked The Lift (1983) I say give this American remake a watch, while I prefer the originals low-budget horror there's still plenty to enjoy with this more comic and over-the-top remake. Watching this again today I was struck how the art deco design of the elevator doors looks a bit like the Hellraiser puzzle box, I wonder if that was on purpose? 

Audio/Video: Down (2001) arrives on makes it US widescreen debut on Blu-ray and DVD from Blue Underground with a lovely new 2K restoration from the original negative approved by Dick Maas, looking great all the way around. Nicely sharp and detailed, colors are saturated, skin tones look good and blacks are solid. Audio options include both loss English and French DTS-HD MA Surround 5.1 options, the surrounds get some good use during the action sequences, everything is well-mixed and balanced, though there's a lot of dubbed English dialogue which can sound canned.  This time around Maas did not create the score, other than the opening main title credit score, with the rest of it created by Dutch composer Paul M. van Brugge, plus songs from The Zombies, Chuck Berry and the most on-the-nose selection, Aerosmith's awful "Love in an Elevator". Optional English subtitles are provided.

Onto the extras we get a new commentary from Writer/Director Dick Maas and Stunt Coordinator Willem de Beukelaer moderated by David Gregory, a good track that details the music of the film, the genesis of the remake, how certain shots and stunts were achieved, and how the movie's commercial potential was hampered when six days into it's theatrical run the 9/11 tragedy happened, and the movie which contains shots of the doomed World Trade Center and references to terrorism and Osama Bin Laden failed to connect.

There's also a 9-min extra detailing the making of the film, I was astounded how much work went into making this one, building the marble-lined interiors of the building, the elevator banks, the exterior and rooftop sets, it was s an eye-opener. There's also nearly three hours of raw behind-the-scenes footage of the making of the film, theatrical and teaser trailers, and a gallery of posters, home video releases, stills and behind-the-scenes images. 

This 2-disc release comes housed in a clear Criterion-style Scanavo case with a sleeve of reversible artwork featuring two art options including the original, The Down artwork and the alternate The Shaft artwork which accompanied the original 2003 Artisan DVD. The discs likewise offer up the same two key artwork options on their visage. There's a 20-page collector's booklet with new writing on the film by Michael Gringold, this includes cast, crew info plus chapter selection, and behind-the-scenes images and stills, plus various posters for this movie as well as Maas' Sint, The lift and Silent Witness. 

Special Features: 
- Audio Commentary with Writer/Director Dick Maas and Stunt Coordinator Willem de Beukelaer moderated by David Gregory 
- The Making of DOWN (9 min) 
- Behind-the-Scenes Footage [Blu-ray Exclusive] (151 min) 
- Theatrical Trailer (2 min) HD 
- Teaser Trailer 1 (1 min) HD 
- Teaser Trailer 2 
- Poster and Still Gallery (87 Images) HD 
- 20-Page Collectible Booklet with new essay by author Michael Gingold

Like the original this one is a lot of fun, totally absurd, not too serious or scary, but wonderfully cheesy with a great cast. The new Blu-ray/DVD combo from Blue Underground offers up a crisp HD  presentation, allowing fans to finally enjoy this one is the original scope aspect ratio with some quality extras.