Have You Been Watching...? The Stairs (2021)

 

I like to keep things positive, as best I can, in these little reviews of mine. When I hear of a film with such a unique premise as The Stairs, my curiosity is piqued and the concept was thrilling. What could possibly go wrong? This. This film is what could go wrong.

Based on an apparently strange American phenomenon, the film’s title is wearing its concept on its sleeve. There have been alleged cases of people finding random staircases in places across America. They don’t lead anywhere. They just appear to exist. Various websites report their supernatural origin, but this movie takes things in another direction. This time folks, spoilers aplenty to come. I’ve seen it, so you don’t have to.

On the face of it, the film has good things going for it. Headline cast includes Kathleen Quinlan (moviegoers may remember her from Apollo 13 and The Twilight Zone Movie) and John Schneider (from Smallville and Dukes of Hazzard). However, failing to make use of their headline stars, or budget restraints, means that the pair barely feature in the movie at all. It’s left to Brent Bailey (who has appeared in episodes of Doom Patrol and Agents of SHIELD), Adam Corson (Lucifer and Twilight Zone 2010 episodes), Josh Crotty, Trin Miller and Stacey Oristano to carry the tale. As an ensemble they’re not too bad portraying the roles they’ve been given. It’s just unfortunate they have been given the roles they’ve been given as they are bland 2-dimensional and extremely unlikeable. There’s no protagonist in the movie that you WANT to root for, to hope they see the end credits.

So the plot goes, John Schneider and his young grandson go into the woods to hunt deer. There (whatever your thought’s are on the subject) goes any sympathy for either of them. Grandson get separated from Grandpops, and finds a stairway in the woods, leading nowhere, they are just there. Complete with dangling chandeliers too! Grandson finds what appears (off-screen) to be some kid of pet he wants to like, but gets dragged in to the under stairs doorway, swiftly followed by Grandpops who tries to save him. Then the set of stairs, the title of the movie, the reason one wants to see it, disappears for most of the rest of the movie.

Enter a group of young people hiking and camping. The two lead men are brothers and stop by a shop where there red-herrings galore (posters indicate bigfoot etc as if to lead you that’s what the film is about). They then meet up with the rest of their unlikeable friends. As they progress into the woods, the film begins to serve some decent creepiness as they have supernatural encounters, including a zombie -type woman and a man who has half his head blown off (yes, indeed!).  The movies then descends into “there’s a monster in the woods picking them off one-by-one” territory. By now, I don’t care who makes it to the end as there appears to be no end to the bad decisions this group of people, who should know better, will make. Clearly the writer write these bad decisions to put them in various places for, y’know, plot.

The stairs do eventually reappear, and our “heroes” venture within the door, finding a kind of factory, with pipes, boilers dark shadows etc, and a young boy. Yes, grandson has survived! Brother 2 gets the boy out, but brother 1 succumbs to the monster, which reminds me of the fluke-man from an early X Files episode.

Plot goes on, but then reveals brother 2 is the friend of Grandson and 20 years have passed for brother 2 and nothing at all for grandson! Grandson has been missing for 20 years to everyone else. Anyway, eventually plot ends (I won’t spoil everything) And Brother 2 and Grandson survive, who them meets his gran and mum. All the others are dead.

Then the feds turn up, and everything we have seen before…becomes a comedy! I swear those last few scenes with the feds are comical and I think they’re SUPPOSED to be.

What is it about? Who knows? What’s the point of the stairs? It’s never discussed, revealed or anything. What’s under the stairs? It is aliens? Time travel? What’s going on? What has the presence of the stairs got to do with any of the other spooky goings on? You will never KNOW! I don’t mind movies letting you draw your own conclusions with things, but this movie literally gives you NOTHING. You put the movie on, you watch it, it ends. Your life or knowledge is none-the-better for the experience. All that is left is the rage that you could have done something more productive with your time.

So overall, unless I get a time machine, I will never get the 90+ minutes of my life back that I wasted watching this. It’s not all bad of course, some of the creepy moments in the woods really are the stuff of nightmares but ruined by the decisions the friends make around those moments. It’s a hotch-potch of ideas. Peter “Drago” Tiemann has a lot to answer for (credits show he directed, co-produced, co-wrote, came up with the concept, co-ordinated stunts, was post-production supervisor and was “body burn” whatever that is.) Maybe another pair of eyes over the script, and production may have helped. It’s a shame because there is a good movie in there. It might have even worked with 30 mins or so shaved off it. Everyone works so hard, and the movie looks so good, it’s just a shame it’s let down by the source material.

So, if you are bored of an evening, with nothing to do, it’s raining outside and nothing on the telly. Go read a book or something. Wash the dishes. Anything. Save yourselves. Just don’t invest your time in this.

Year – 2021

Availability – Amazon Prime (at time of writing. Various language and subtitle options)

HYBW movie rating – 3/10 (hey, people worked hard on this, I’m not giving it NOTHING, it has a few redeeming features)