Review of The People Under the Stairs (1991) by Kelsey Z — 21 Oct 2008

This is the most underrated Wes Craven film. With such insanity displayed to such extreme measures with terrifying and gripping characters, Iâ??m not quite sure why. The film follows a young boy, desperate to help his family from losing their apartment.

When he tries to do this through the landlords, he soon finds out that he is up for a twisted adventure. The landlords wanted the perfect child. Every child they would have would do something wrong. In their eyes, this could constitute as just about anything.

So they would lock them in the basement and treat them like monsters, which they would in fact turn in to after the torturous conditions. The parents would then get a new one and the same thing would happen.

This happened to enough people to fill a basement. Alice was the only one who wasnâ??t stuck done there. She has sacrificed having a real life to stay out of that basement and she has still been abused physically, mentally, and emotionally.

The characters were portrayed brilliantly. Fool was young, curious, and had gone through a lot. He was surrounded by horror and still was worried about helping Alice. Aliceâ??s character was completely tortured.

She did everything she could to keep the torture at a minimal level. She was still sympathetic to Fool though. The people living under the stairs are pretty terrifying. They are convincing through vicious ways that are only there because of their â??parentsâ??.

The Landlords were by far the most effective characters. They were strict abusers towards their children. They took solid beliefs to the extreme and turned good in to evil. They were so deranged and seriously insane.

They had such a massive desire for others pain. They had to kill or at least harm everyone they could as a means of building up their pride. They wanted only good to be around and in the process created so much evil.

They had to beat everyone, they had to win, and they had to do this to convince themselves what they did was right. Itâ??s not just about what they did, itâ??s how they did it. The passion in their eyes, words, and actions were so distinct.

The People Under the Stairs serves as a criticism of child abuse and extremist Christian values, and just how these things can be twisted to create farther evils than we would ever think about in normal circumstances.