Maybe it's high time that Tamil Cinema starts making genuine horror movies instead of these adulterated horror-comedies that don't work most of the time. I mean literally every tamil horror movie is actually a messed up Horror-comedy. Lift is just another addition to this long queue.
The film has an intriguing premise (Stuck in the Lift with a Ghost). But it has been completely wasted because we are too stubborn to let go off our traditional horror-comedy way infused with heroic moments.
The comedy here doesn't work as they are more of mocking the Toxic work culture which is a serious issue. And the forced Romance! Like the genre has not been diluted enough already. I don't know what woman develops feelings for a stranger who intentionally destroys her smartphone. I just hope such stupid immature women don't exist. But that's our heroine here.
Speaking of our main character, the Ghost (it's a horror movie, not a hero movie). Here is where the director was clean bowled. It could probably compete with our heroine for stupidity. Same old story - some bad people kill an innocent; innocent's ghost is now on a revenge mission and it accomplishes it single handedly. Actually it has completed the mission at the beginning of the film itself. The Protagonists (both hero and heroine) are not even related to this remotely. Nor do they aid in the Ghost's mission like in the Muni franchise. Maybe now the Ghost has nothing to do in it's freetime, it decided to get some company. Tormenting and haunting the Protagonists till the kill themselves. A ghost with a code, I guess. It wants to kill two kinds of people, a bad kind and an innocent kind. But doesn't want the innocent's blood on it's hands. That's got to be the most annoyingly stupid ghost character I've ever seen in a horror movie. On top of that, it's actually two ghosts, not one. Both being stupid.
The only decent character is our hero. Kavin does give a good performance. Especially the scene where he gets trapped alone in the Lift with the ghost. It's actually the only scene that's scary enough to watch in the whole film. And Kavin pulls it off superbly.
Other than that there's nothing good or scary here. Everytime something starts to happen, we expect a frightening one but the stupid ghosts end up pulling chairs and remote controlling the lift. Even kids can scare better. Plotholes, unnecessary characters, tonal inconsistencies etc. The film is a complete mess.
Some people say that the lift is actually a metaphor for toxic work culture. That it has been perfectly captured by the cinematographer. But the revelation that the film is about toxicity of corporate atmosphere happens too late. At the very end, that it has no impact at all except for these over-analysers trying to give a deeper meaning to the lift scenes which the director himself has terribly failed at showing visually.
In short, Kavin has got into a Lift that keeps going down and down, no matter how hard he tries to repair it.
The film has an intriguing premise (Stuck in the Lift with a Ghost). But it has been completely wasted because we are too stubborn to let go off our traditional horror-comedy way infused with heroic moments.
The comedy here doesn't work as they are more of mocking the Toxic work culture which is a serious issue. And the forced Romance! Like the genre has not been diluted enough already. I don't know what woman develops feelings for a stranger who intentionally destroys her smartphone. I just hope such stupid immature women don't exist. But that's our heroine here.
Speaking of our main character, the Ghost (it's a horror movie, not a hero movie). Here is where the director was clean bowled. It could probably compete with our heroine for stupidity. Same old story - some bad people kill an innocent; innocent's ghost is now on a revenge mission and it accomplishes it single handedly. Actually it has completed the mission at the beginning of the film itself. The Protagonists (both hero and heroine) are not even related to this remotely. Nor do they aid in the Ghost's mission like in the Muni franchise. Maybe now the Ghost has nothing to do in it's freetime, it decided to get some company. Tormenting and haunting the Protagonists till the kill themselves. A ghost with a code, I guess. It wants to kill two kinds of people, a bad kind and an innocent kind. But doesn't want the innocent's blood on it's hands. That's got to be the most annoyingly stupid ghost character I've ever seen in a horror movie. On top of that, it's actually two ghosts, not one. Both being stupid.
The only decent character is our hero. Kavin does give a good performance. Especially the scene where he gets trapped alone in the Lift with the ghost. It's actually the only scene that's scary enough to watch in the whole film. And Kavin pulls it off superbly.
Other than that there's nothing good or scary here. Everytime something starts to happen, we expect a frightening one but the stupid ghosts end up pulling chairs and remote controlling the lift. Even kids can scare better. Plotholes, unnecessary characters, tonal inconsistencies etc. The film is a complete mess.
Some people say that the lift is actually a metaphor for toxic work culture. That it has been perfectly captured by the cinematographer. But the revelation that the film is about toxicity of corporate atmosphere happens too late. At the very end, that it has no impact at all except for these over-analysers trying to give a deeper meaning to the lift scenes which the director himself has terribly failed at showing visually.
In short, Kavin has got into a Lift that keeps going down and down, no matter how hard he tries to repair it.