(no subject)
The Descent (2005)
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Dir: Neil Marshall
Cast: Shauna Macdonald, Natalie Jackson Mendoza, Alex Reid, Saskia Mulder, MyAnna Buring, Nora-Jane Noone
This horror film has a pretty basic premise: a group of six women, one of whom (Sarah, played by Shauna Macdonald) is recovering from the loss of loved ones, go on a potholing trip in the Appalachian Mountains. However, what should have been a relatively easy cave system turns out to have its own complications, not least of them being a race of underground-dwelling, flesh-eating creatures.
Doesn't sound too promising does it? However, the quality of this film, as with writer/director Neil Marshall's previous effort Dog Soldiers, comes not from the rather contrived and unoriginal plot but from the whole execution. In fact, this film genuinely improves upon its already great predecessor, actually becoming a masterpiece of its genre.
With great use of sets, lighting, colour and cinematography, the cave is transformed into a claustrophobic nightmare world. However, atmosphere isn't the only area where director Marshall triumphs: it is also in the deployment of the many shocks and action/suspense sequences. His knack of catching the viewer off-guard is really what horror should be about, but all too rarely is. What's more, although it is about 3/4 of an hour before the creatures finally make an appearance, the film still finds plenty of ways to shock and thrill before then.
Gore fans won't be let down either, there are (quite literally, at one point) pools of it here. It's all very realistically executed and often genuinely wince-inducing.
The acting and dialogue are mostly excellent and believable. I got the feeling that Marshall had actually signed up and spent some time with a potholing club while he was writing the script. It is refreshing to see female characters in a horror film who are neither vacuous bimbos nor self-consciously ironic post-feminist wisecrackers. It is also interesting that, while these characters always remain essentially sympathetic, the actions of some of them are egocentric, self-centred, inept or vengeful, whether in the name of survival or of an overriding sense of looking out for their companions. This helps to make the film's culmination, including a deliberately ambiguous ending, seem all the more tragic.
In short, it's both extraordinarily savage and intelligent at the same time. A must-see for any horror fan.