Dead Drop

Screening at 6pm on Saturday, Oct. 17 at Nightmares Film Festival.

by George Wolf

You like your thrillers with a good dose of blood splatter? Maybe even some deadly puzzle-solving and jabs of dark humor? Well, stand next to me for Dead Drop, a wickedly fun ride on a lethal freight elevator.

One hectic morning inside a large office building, the main elevator seems to be on the fritz. So eight strangers decide the large freight elevator down the hall will speed their busy day along, and they get in.

They push the buttons, the doors close, but the ride is a short one. The elevator stalls, and they are all trapped.

Writer/director Ned Crowley quickly sets an effective sense of people and place, getting us comfortable with the different personalities that will have to work together for a path to safety. The snappy dialog begins to reveal important connections between the “Teacher,” “Bike Messenger,” “Troll,” “Lawyer,” “Actress,” “Suit,” “Priest” and “Bro,” and that maybe this fateful meeting is not as happenstance as it seems.

There are engineering clues to decipher as well, and Crowley (Killing Faith) adopts a wonderfully mischievous tone for his frisky mashup of Cube, Saw, and even a dash of Da Vinci Code. The bloodshed can be sudden, and shocking, with Crowley making sure it all pops in the frame for maximum WTF? appeal.

The ensemble cast is locked in to the vibe that’s driven home by a couple well-played needle drops. And by the time the other narrative shoe drops as well, you’ll most likely be smiling at how skillfully Dead Drop pushes your buttons.