The Brazilian variety show, Programa Silvio Santos is a modern Brazilian version of Candid Camera, known for fairly mundane camera gags with titles like Magnetic Soup and Pig Grinder .
Not this time!
Programa Silvio Santos released a prank they titled Ghost in the Elevator which is not just more elaborate and crazy than all their other pranks but is being largely regarded as actual torture (see video below) .
The prank starts out like any other haunted house gag, with the lights inside of the elevator flickering and the elevator slightly bouncing around. The a little girl pops out clutching a doll and she starts to scream, not just a little sceam but the sound that a person makes when they are being hacked to death by a homicidal lunatic.
The participants, who took the elevator with no real idea that this was going to happen, look not just like they are scared but like they actually may have to clean themselves after the gag is over.
The worst part? The dystopian laugh track playing over scenes of random people losing a good ten years off their lifespan.
The gag follows a disturbing pattern both overseas and in the US where television shows, in order to boost ratings, are resorting to pranks that leave the intended victims scarred for life from the emotional beating they take. American talk show host, Jimmy Kimmel , recently released video footage where he asked parents to film their kids as they lied to them and told them that all of their Halloween candy had been eaten. The audience seems to think that making children cry uncontrollably is really funny these day.
Click here to watch Ghost in the Elevator
