Yet another reason why I will never go caving (again) (The Descent (Special Edition, 2 DVDs))

Member Name: Fairydustbitch

Product:	The Descent (Special Edition, 2 DVDs)
Date:	05/03/06 (444 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: creepy camera work and setting, very edge-of-your-seat

Disadvantages: Not very scary scary things

Written and directed by Neil Marshall, “The Descent” is every claustrophobic’s worst nightmare, and if you found Gollum from “Lord of the Rings” scary you might want to give this one a wide berth. Following 2002’s very strange “Dog Soldiers” comes this equally weird and creepy little tale of six souls lost in a massive cavern, being followed by some sinister little monsters that you half expect to start rasping about “my precious” any moment.


Sarah is recovering from a tragic car accident that happened one year ago and claimed the life of her husband and her daughter. She reunites with her adventure-seeking friends in the Appalachian Mountains to go caving. Juno is a ballsy, ambitious American bird, Holly is a real thrill seeker, and Beth is Sarah’s best friend. I kept getting the other characters mixed up (what? Its hard to tell who’s who when your watching people lit by torchlight in a cave), but there is also Sam and Rebecca. Juno lies and tells them that they are taking a caving expedition in set of caves that has been previously discovered, when in fact she takes them to an entirely new set of caves where no one has gone before (or more likely, no-one has gotten out alive). Once down in the pit, things start to go slightly wrong. Sarah panics and gets stuck in a tunnel, which caves in shortly after she gets herself out of it, and she notices strange childish giggles and something racing about in the dark. Juno’s secret soon comes out, and as the women find themselves totally lost in the caves and they begin to panic and fall apart, the secret inhabitants of the caves reveal themselves…strange, blind, albino humanoid things that are looking for their next meal. Guess who’s on the menu?


The cast is mostly made up of not-very-well-known actresses, and to be perfectly honest at the beginning of the movie their acting skills are not up to much, they are a bit on the cheesy side. However, once the exciting, creepy part of the movie gets underway they are more than adequate in their respective roles. Shauna McDonald is particularly good in the role of Sarah, a woman who is being haunted by more than creepy little Smeagoly things. Natalie Mendoza is also great as Juno, a woman who often seems to care more for adventure seeking than her friends, and Norah-Jane Noone (the Magdalene Sisters) is fun to watch as the gutsy but not particularly lucky Holly. In the end I think it’s the setting and storyline of the film that makes it work, rather than the acting, and sometimes the girls seem so similar in attitude that they seem like one person. Sarah and Juno are the only ones who really seem to have their own personalities, but I’m willing to forgive the director on this point as this is hardly a girly bonding flick.

The movie starts out creepily enough, with long echoey caverns lit by flares and flashlights. This was the point that made my skin crawl more than anything….possibly because I had a not-very-fun caving experience when I was younger too (although it didn’t involve creepy creatures of any sort). The film has a real claustrophobic fear-factor feel to it, and the setting ultimately ends up more frightening than the beasties, the feeling of the walls bearing in on the women is totally engaging. The camera work cleverly makes it looks like the women are being watched all the time, and the clever cuts round ridiculously narrow tunnels and passageways add to the “trapped” feeling of the whole film. Even without the nasty Gollum thingies, the film starts out in a truly terrifying way, with the women crawling through passages that you are sure are not big enough to admit their bodies. There are a few heart-stopping scenes, such as the women having to climb across the ceiling of a deep underground ravine, before the Crawlers even start to appear. For me this part of the film was more scary, with the pitch-black, the slimy walls and the sense of being stalked by something intangible.

Ah, the Crawlers. Well put it this way they aren’t the scariest horror film creatures I’ve seen. As I’ve said, they’re more like Gollum from Lord of the Rings than anything that is pant-wettingly scary. Creepy at first when all you see is a flash of them disappearing in the caves in front of the women, but once you actually see them, as in most horror films, the freak factor reduces suddenly. Despite being unable to see they are suspiciously accurate at detecting their opponents next move in the many scenes where the women have to do battle with them, and this made my eyebrow raise, seeing as in other scenes the creatures actually stand on them without noticing they are there (which is daft, you’d imagine the hair and the heat on a live human’s head would give away the fact that they were not a rock). All in all the beasties seem quite inconsistent, sometimes it seems as though they can see very well, others it doesn’t. They are perhaps not terrifying, but more creepy…slimy and clingy and with a strange insect-like movement. However, this film looks like a fairly low-budget affair, and for that, they are suitably creepy.

The true scary part of this film lies in Sarah, the main character, becoming less human. It gets to the point where she is willing to injure her “friends” in order to survive herself, and by the end, drenched in blood and for all the world look like Sissy Spacek during the pigs blood drenching scene in “Carrie”, you have to wonder whether she remains a human or whether she has become more like one of the nasty beasties. You can see her becoming more and more insane as the film goes on, and who can blame her, her sense of survival is taken over by something much more creepy.

In the true depressive British way, the film lacks the predictable Hollywood ending, instead opting for an interesting twist that could prove confusing if you haven’t been watching closely. In fact, I have heard that the Americans are so out of touch with the ending that they have lopped part of it off before they released it in America. The film neatly avoids being predictable for the most part (the exceptions are when you see a close-up of one of the characters and it becomes obvious that there is a Crawler lurking behind them waiting to strike, this classic horror movie trick is a tad over-used in this movie) and the last few scenes of the film will have you totally taken in. One of the good things about the ending is that it is open to interpretation. In some ways, it can be seen as quite a happy ending, in others it is totally gruesome and sad.

The film raises some incredibly interesting questions, something which gory horror movies do tend to be lacking in, it is perhaps more in line with intelligent movies like “28 Days Later” than your standard horror flick as it makes you think. One of the things I found most interesting was the idea of new species being out there that we haven’t discovered. Scientists recently discovered a totally deserted area of forest with new species, including mammals (I believe in was in Australasia somewhere, feel free to contradict me). This raises questions as to what else is lurking out there that we haven’t discovered, and many theories abound with regards to this film and what the Crawlers are actually supposed to be. Clearly they are creatures evolved from common roots with humans, they have a distinctly human shape to them. So are they humans that were separated by a great rockfall thousands of years ago that has seen them adapt to life in a cavernous abyss? Or are they the dead souls of previous pot-holers who found themselves lost in the caverns? One of the great things about the Crawlers are they are not your usual fright-night creatures, impossible to kill and always coming back for one last scare, something that is boringly overdone in horror movies. They are clearly mortal, not that this lessens their ability to make your skin crawl.

This leads neatly to the question, what makes us human and what separates us from instinct driven animals like the creatures in this film? As Sarah herself finds herself on the slippery slope to terror-induced insanity, does that reduce her humanity and turn her into something as scary as these beasties? Issues of trust are also raised as the moment these women realised they are completely lost, their relationships start to break down and they begin to mistrust one another. Of course, put in that situation, who wouldn’t fall to pieces?

All in all, the Descent is a creepy, claustrophobic film that manages to avoid most of the over-used horror movie traps. There is a reasonable amount of gore, but not too much, and although the term “edge of your seat” is overused with regards to most films, this one deserves the title. It wasn’t until the movie was finished that I found all my muscles were tensed up, and rare is the movie that has actually made me cover my eyes. Unsettling from the moment the women enter the cave, the film is suitable spine-chilling and a real breath of fresh air from your usual overproduced horror movie crap. The thing that lets it down, for me anyway, is the Crawlers themselves. Creepy little buggers they are but I don’t know if they deserve the title of truly terrifying. However that doesn’t really matter as the setting, the urgent pace and the sense of being watched all the time lend this movie a creep factor all of its own. If you like your horror films relying on suspense, storyline and clever camera work, setting and direction, you will probably enjoy this one immensely. If your idea of a horror movie is a masked slasher chasing down a large breasted girl then I suggest you give this one a wide berth.

Summary: Six women get stalked by Gollum...