"If this is the start of the series, then bring on more of The Night Chronicles, because Devil is great fun without any pretense, and the best thing Night's name has been on in years. With this movie, they've finally made something that has a shot at being seen by a wide audience that's not a remake and it's not so graphic it will scare people away." Drew McWeeny HITFIX "Promoted as a claustrophobic supernatural horror film, Devil is about five people trapped in an elevator, one of them a devil who kills the others. While that certainly describes the film’s elegantly simple premise, the experience is actually bigger than that. A clever and dark little tale of horror with an entertaining 'whodunit' aspect to it. Give Devil a try. It's a creepy little story that succeeds because of its taut direction and smart writing. Creepy and Clever." Frank Wilkins REELTALK MOVIE REVIEWS "Chance, fate and the devil get together in a story from M. Night Shyamalan. With a pounding music counterpoint of panting strings and booming brass, the none too subtle mood of discomfort is set. The lift lurches and so do our stomachs. We discover secrets about the people in the lift. Does one of them have a bigger secret: a secret of evil? Then the body count begins." Louise Keller URBAN CINEFILE "The fact that most of the action in this film takes place in the elevator car in a confined space adds to the tension in the movie. Add to the small space the fact that the lights keep going on and off and you have a boiling pot of terror. A surprisingly suspenseful and entertaining film." JACKIE K KOOPER "A Sunday school parable wrapped in an adequately nail-biting supernatural thriller, Devil uses its triteness to its advantage. There are a sufficient number of jolts thanks to quick edits and sound effects, plus the script's efficient structure. Chris Messina gives a strong performance." BOXOFFICE MAGAZINE

"Don't be fooled by the melodramatic speechifying this film offers. Sly winks aplenty beneath the good and evil bluster. Does Devil teach Old Scratch any new tricks? Not especially, but if you're looking for a ripping yarn, the elevator has room for one more. And yes, there's a twist, but it's not the kind of groany pud puller you might expect." Shaula Clark BOSTON PHOENIX "A man falls from the 35th floor of a skyscraper, a security guard is electrocuted, five people are trapped in an elevator: Is a lazy maintenance staff responsible, or could it be: Satan? A modest and sometimes silly but fun thriller; the killings are ingeniously crafted so that the deaths occur offscreen, which doesn't lessen their impact." John Beifuss COMMERCIAL APPEAL "A much better film than it will be given credit for, which is a shame, particularly in an era in which horror films increasingly focus on trendy nihilistic pointlessness. It is an unabashed horror film with genuine Judeo-Christian spiritual convictions. The visual extremes of high and low echo the story’s belief in the fundamental powers of both good and evil, and its vacillation between the relative safety of light and the absolute terror of the dark reminds us of their constant struggle." James Kendrick Q NETWORK FILM DESK "Devil, the superior, super-creepy supernatural thriller from producer M. Night Shyamalan, opens with a gorgeous aerial shot of the Philly skyline. Devil is guaranteed to keep you on tenterhooks from beginning to end and without much gore. Dowdle and company trade in the usual trappings of the genre for a tantalizing blend of tension, suspense, and mystery." Tirdad Derakhshani PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER "Don't let the Shyamalan snickering sway you from seeing this in theaters. You're bound to see it on DVD or cable down the line and regret that it took you that long to discover how good a film it actually is. the film constantly teeters on a dark edge that is effectively creepy without having to show too much. 'Devil' is a creepy and captivating good time." Peter Hall CINEMATICAL

The Inside Story Over the years, blockbuster filmmaker and 2006 ShoWest Award Director Of The Year M. Night Shyamalan ("The Sixth Sense" & "Signs") has written down many ideas for stories he imagined to one day turn into movies. As the pages of his notebooks filled, Shyamalan knew that he couldn’t transform all the treatments into screenplays and direct the feature-length films by himself. "You can put your love into all of them and know that you can’t direct them all yourself. I decided to take some of these ideas and make them as a series of films by up and coming filmmakers and actors." Shyamalan (who made his debut in 1992 with "Praying with Anger") partnered with longtime producer Sam Mercer ("Unbreakable" & "Jarhead") and (MRC) Media Rights Capital ("Babel" & "Deception") to produce "The Night Chronicles", a series of films based on his original ideas. In its agreement, MRC agreed to produce several of Shyamalan’s original ideas, and "Devil" is the first of three films to be made under the banner. "Devil was the straight up, right down the middle super-scary movie. It was the one that was most on my mind at the time when we decided to create The Night Chronicles," Shyamalan explained. When asked the inspiration in having fellow artists bring to life his ideas, Shyamalan laughs: "It could be a benevolent thing, but it’s really not. I want to be inspired and pushed and connected to the audience, and it’s nice to have younger people who are connected to the heartbeat of what is being felt today. It’s great to be in the game, taking risks and having people constantly challenging me; it’s a way to stay excited." Shyamalan’s concept for the film was to explore what would happen if the Devil manipulated and trapped a group of people into the same location and punished them for their wrongdoings. Shyamalan wanted to explore how the Devil hides among us and brings people with a common thread of wickedness into a situation…and how he systematically tests them before revealing himself. The filmmaker used the setting of a common office elevator as the location where the cursed five would meet. He explains his rationale: "Normally when you’re in an elevator, you don’t look at anybody and then the door opens and you leave. But if you get stuck in that confined space, you have to look at everybody and ask, 'Who am I in here with?' Then when the first bad thing happens, all those faces become threatening." Fellow producer Mercer (2004 "Van Helsing") was drawn to collaborate on "Devil" because he felt it explores "a story that is familiar to the audience, one with the everyman factor. We all could walk into that elevator, and we could be trapped with six people in it for six hours and have a very emotional experience. One of the worst nightmares is being trapped somewhere. Think about what you don’t want to be trapped in, and that’s in an elevator stuck between the twenty first and twenty second floors. When the lights go out, the Muzak won’t shut off and there’s chaos: and then people start dying; that’s terrifying. That’s what this film is all about: preying upon your fears." Shyamalan shares that his interest in creating this series is based on a prolific role model of his own. "Agatha Christie is someone whose stories I aspire to emulate. I want the audience to see many stories from me that say something about a time in my life or something I believe in. "The Night Chronicles" has given me that chance." For Shyamalan, the process of choosing the writers and directors for "The Night Chronicles", would become an expanded and comprehensive education in film. As he began his search, he would uncover a treasure trove of talent. "I was able to watch every cool, scary thriller and horror movie that hasn’t come out yet and get to talk to these filmmakers and figure out how they think." Once the series was established, Shyamalan searched for a writer to execute the treatment he created: five strangers who are connected by a common thread become stuck in an office building elevator in Philadelphia, a location he has used before in "Wide Awake" (1998), "The Sixth Sense" (1999), "Unbreakable" (2000), "Signs" (2002) and "The Village" (2004). Unfortunately for four of them, one is the Devil himself. Given such a simple, yet chilling, premise, Shyamalan wanted a screenwriter with the precise sensibility to flesh out his idea and run with it. He found that voice in Brian Nelson, whose script for director David Slade’s provocative "Hard Candy" helped launch the career of a young actress named Ellen Page ("Inception"). "I loved Brian Nelson’s Hard Candy. It was brilliantly written, so I hired him as the writer for "Devil". He turned my fourteen page treatment into a fully developed, exciting screenplay." Now that the script was written, it was time for Shyamalan and Mercer to decide on the director for Devil. When word went out that "The Night Chronicles" was looking for talented new filmmakers to balance human stories with drama and thrills, the company was inundated with submissions. Shyamalan recalls the process of selecting brothers John Erick and Drew Dowdle for the project. "I was sent a really disturbing movie called "The Poughkeepsie Tapes" to watch, and this movie was the first I saw in my new house. It was a terrible decision, because it just scared me so much. I loved the filmmaking in it, and I thought these guys were amazing. I heard they were making another movie, so I begged Screen Gems to show me Quarantine before it came out." The level of fear the brothers were able to elicit with the thriller astonished him. Told from the perspective of a news crew that is embedded in a cordoned-off Los Angeles apartment in which the tenants have contracted a horrific contagion, the film made a successful entry in to the horror genre. "I loved "Quarantine" and felt the combination of these two movies gave the Dowdles the perfect point of view for Devil," Shyamalan notes. "They’re the nicest guys you’ll ever meet, have a really good edge, a great sense of humor and they’re smart. And they’re just crazy and deranged enough for the job." And his first thought when the lights came on? "These are the guys!" The Dowdle Brothers collaborated at every stage of development, casting and filming. "Night’s been amazing. He’s smart, enthusiastic and he’s given us a long leash, which has been a treat," says John Dowdle. "Night’s a director first and a producer second, so he’s giving us the reins a director dreams of. He let us be creative and freaky and encouraged us to have fun. What made it all even better was that we thought the story was perfect for us; like our previous films, it had a lot of reality-style elements." It was crucial to both Shyamalan and Mercer that the Dowdle brothers knew they were coming onto a project in which they wouldn’t be micromanaged. "It has been an inspiring experience working with the Dowdles. I have been continually impressed with their vision and creativity throughout the development and casting process. Together, we have found a talented group of actors who we believe will be stars of tomorrow." The core cast in Devil consists of five characters trapped in an office tower elevator and the anguished Philadelphia police officer and two security guards who are trying to extricate them. For the Dowdle brothers, it was important to find just the right actors. "We cast a wide net and found the best actors for the roles. In the elevator, we had to cast it as a group; it was important to find five very different types of people to bring unique energy and their differences. We realized that each one of these five actors has very different acting styles, and a very different sense of their craft," John Dowdle ("The Dry Spell") notes. Casting these characters was no small task. The roles are closely integrated, and the filmmakers approached each one as part of an ensemble. Fresh faces were desired so that audiences wouldn’t have expectations skewed by past signature roles. Hundreds auditioned, and eventually only eight headshots remained. "The eight actors we hired all have a parity with each other in terms of acting skill and presence on screen," Shyamalan says, "and they could all be stars of tomorrow." To portray the two women trapped alongside the mechanic, salesman and security guard, the team found young Australian actress and NIDA graduate Bojana Novakovic (a standout in her role in "Drag Me to Hell") who recently starred in "Edge Of Darkness" and veteran character actress Jenny O’Hara ("Mystic River" & "Matchstick Men"). John Dowdle described why they chose these performers. "Bojana is wonderful to look at. She’s such a great, intense actor, and she brings so much emotion. Her eyes say so much, and she’s such an intense presence, even though in a lot of the film she’s quiet. And Jenny O'Hara is always such a delight; she is so fun to work with. Jenny has quite a lot of theatre background." Chris Messina was selected to portray the role of Detective Bowden, the Philadelphia cop who is brought in to manage the unfolding crisis. Much of the film is seen from his perspective in the security office. We follow along with him as he watches the events unfold from cameras in the elevator. The up and coming actor has already worked with acclaimed filmmakers such as Woody Allen ("Vicky Cristina Barcelona") and Nora Ephron ("Julie & Julia"). "Chris came in and did a fantastic audition," Shyamalan recalls. Alongside Messina are Caraway security officers Ramirez and Lustig, played by Jacob Vargas ("Traffic" & "Death Race") and Matt Craven ("Disturbia" & "Public Enemies"). "Chris, Jacob and Matt were so great together,"says John Dowdle. "The three of them had such a natural chemistry that a lot of what I had to do in the security office was just stay out of their way. The three of them were such different types and had such a stronghold on their characters. While the film has its twists, the making of "Devil" had a twist of its own. In the autumn of 2009 "Devil" began production" Stage 4 at Pinewood Toronto Studios provided the ideal location. It afforded the filmmakers the opportunity to build the sets to the exact specifications of the script. An M. Night Shyamalan movie not shot in Philadelphia? "Toronto is a special city for me because it was the first city that I showed my first movie. When I was twenty one years old, I made a movie for no money in India. I had just finished it and submitted it to the Toronto International Film Festival, and they said yes and screened it in their festival. I remember flying to Toronto when I was 21 and feeling like this is the greatest city ever. To come back and make the first Night Chronicles here is poetic," Shyamalan explained. The mood of the film is captured by legendary cinematographer Tak Fujimoto A.S.C. whose body of work includes: "Silence Of The Lamb", "Gladiator", "Devil in a Blue Dress" and "The Manchurian Candidate". This is Fujimoto's fourth collaboration with Shyamalan. Audiences watching Devil can expect a roller-coaster ride that also offers a compelling story about taking responsibility for our lives. What It's All About

Five strangers in Philadelphia begin their day with the most commonplace of routines. They walk into an office tower and enter an elevator. As they convene into this single place, they are forced to share a confined space with strangers. Nobody acknowledges anyone else. These five stangers will only be together for a few moments. What appears to be a random occurrence is anything but coincidental when the car becomes stuck. Fate has come calling. Today these five strangers will have their secrets revealed, and face a reckoning for their transgressions. Slowly, methodically, as time ticks by, their situation turns from mere annoyance to sheer helplessness and finally, abject terror. One by one, terrible things begin to happen to each of them and suspicion shifts as to who among the five is making it all happen: until they learn the unspeakable truth: unfortunately one of them is the Devil himself.

The Verdict "Cinematical movie critic Peter Hall echoes my thoughts as the end credits for "Devil" rolled. Those who give this one a miss will be terribly disappointed when "Devil" is released on DVD because "it took you that long to discover how good a film it actually is." Forget that this has M. Night Shyamalan listed in the credits. Shyamalan has finally come to the realization that he can't direct, write and produce every story he thinks up. So what did he decide? Give it to some of the up and coming talents and let them loose. It has worked a treat in this, the first edition of "The Night Chronicles": "Devil". Besides being trapped beneath the rubble of an earthquake, buried alive by terrorists, thrown into a pit filled with poisonous snakes or bloody great hairy spiders with huge venomous fangs, there is one other form of terror that most of us hope we can avoid: being trapped in an elevator. There is something worse though. Being trapped in an elevator with four other people and one of them is the Devil. Now that's a nightmare! If you can't imagine the horror, go see "Devil". Produced by Sam Mercer and M. Night Shyamalan this is a first class example of how scary a film can get without having to resort to confronting the audience with gruesome imagery that leaves one mentally scarred. Everything about this film speaks volumes for those who contributed to "Devil". From its stunning opening, the massive score from Fernando Velázquez, the terrifying images captured by Tak Fujimoto, to the revealing end, "Devil" achieves what it sets out to do: entertain, scare and even make us laugh. Worth the effort. 4 STARS." Who's Playing Who?

Chris Messina Logan Marshall-Green Jenny O'Hara Bojana Novakovic Bokeem Woodbine Geoffrey Arend Jacob Vargas Matt Craven Joshua Peace Caroline Dhavernas Joe Cobden Zoie Palmer Vincent Laresca Rudy Webb Craig Eldridge Robert Lee Genadijs Dolganovs Joe Pingue Jonathan Potts Alice Poon

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Detective Bowden Mechanic Old Woman Young Woman Guard Salesman JRamirez Lustig Detective Markowitz Elsa Nahai Dwight Cheryl Henry Old Janitor Donnelly Chinese Man Janitor Business Bureau Clerk Wayne Kazan Officer Choi

The Crew Directed by John Erick Dowdle Screenplay by Brian Nelson From a story by M. Night Shyamalan Produced by Sam Mercer & M. Night Shyamalan Original Music by Fernando Velázquez Cinematography by Tak Fujimoto Film Editing by Elliot Greenberg Casting by Debra Zane Costume Design by Erin Benach Run Time 80 minutes Rated M [AUST] Copyright ©2010 - Universal Pictures - All Rights Reserved ©1999-2010 - The Movie Pages & Impact Internet Services - All Rights Reserved. Protected by Australian & International Copyright, Trademark Laws & Intellectual Property Rights.