Viewed on Streaming. Director Keisuke Horibe delivers a tale of suspense that is novel, scary, and highly suspenseful (complete with clever plot twists, a truly surprising surprise ending prior to the closing credits, and a second one after the closing credits!). It revolves around four characters who become "trapped" in a rigged apartment-house elevator. One is the designated trap-pee (a weak-willed philandering husband who has just visited his mistress); the others are the trappers (their leader has been hired by the husband's pregnant wife to extract him from his girl friend's clutches before the baby arrives). The initial plan (scripted and rehearsed by the trappers) is to apply mostly nonviolent, but acute group-shock therapy (with a convenient elevator serving as a quick prison) to irrevocably (hopefully) change the husband 's wayward ways. A pretty clever and straight forward extra-legal approach to neutralizing the problem. But all is not as it seems. Some of the trappers belatedly discover they are De facto trap-pees and victims of an elaborate and diabolically clever con job (or so it would seem). Acting is good and remarkably so in the confining elevator scenes where it seems that improvisation is helping to hold the viewer's interest in performances delivered within a confined space. Cinematography (semi-wide screen, color) is so-so (the use of an elevator set that is larger than normal is obvious in some floor-level shots) and may (at least in part) have been defeated by poor interior set design. Inter-scene lighting is fine. Score is unique in composition and delivery (music comes and goes in waves). Original source material looks and sounds great. Subtitles are good enough given the everyday-conversational use of short lines. A low-budget yet highly enjoyable and memorial film. WILLIAM FLANIGAN, PhD.
Review of Akumu no erebêtâ
