Originally published on metropolis.co.jp on October 2010

©2010「死刑台のエレベーター」 製作委員会

With her mysterious gaze and slightly mocking smile, Michiko Kichise is the epitome of an old-school femme fatale. So it’s no wonder that director Akira Ogata chose the 35-year-old actress to star in Shikeidai no Elevator, a Japanese-language remake of Louis Malle’s acclaimed debut, Ascenseur pour l’échafaud. Considered one of the classics of film noir, the 1958 film (English title: Elevator to the Gallows) starred Jeanne Moreau and Maurice Ronet as illicit lovers planning the perfect crime.

In Ogata’s remake, Kichise (Bloody Monday) plays Meiko, the rich wife of the president of a medical group. She comes up with a plan for her lover Tokito (Hiroshi Abe of Trick fame) to kill her husband and make it look like a suicide. But with one small mistake and a broken elevator, what started as the perfect crime begins to spiral out of control. Of Meiko’s signature line—“Kill that man and steal me for yourself”—Kichise admits, “I was only able to say that because it was part of the character, but I really enjoyed it.”

For the 50-year-old Ogata (Nonchan Noriben), remaking a 50-year-old film that Malle wrote and directed at the age of 25 was an exciting yet overwhelming experience. At a recent press conference in Tokyo, he told reporters, “When the producer approached me and asked, ‘Are you interested?’ I thought, ‘As a filmmaker, how could I not be interested?’”

Shikeidai provided technical difficulties for the filmmaker and his cast as well—Abe’s character spends most of the film trapped inside an elevator. “He has to express his humanity, his weakness and pride,” Ogata explains. “It was a huge challenge, but also lots of fun.”

For Abe, the film provided a rare chance to play an easily manipulated, “human” character. Takito, he explains, is “serious and idealistic, but that gradually breaks down.” At over six feet tall, Abe is typically cast in more rugged, tough-guy roles, although the actor says he doesn’t actually have a very strong personality. “It didn’t go quite so far, but I’ve been in a relationship like this before,” he admits.

“I’d like to have power over a man like that,” Kichise chimes in. “I’m jealous that [Meiko] had someone who cared for her that much.”