The Descent

Sarah (Shauna Macdonald), Beth (Alex Reid) and Juno (Natalie Mendoza), joined by three other feisty girls, meet up for their annual extreme sports adventure, this year in the Appalachian Mountains. Although intended to cheer up Sarah after the tragedy of the last jaunt, things get off to a very bad start when Juno reveals to the group that the cave they have just entered is unmapped and unexplored. Unfortunately, despite avoiding ‘the tourist trap,’ the girls find themselves face to face with a clan of devolved savage humans, who have adapted to hunting for food in the caves.

Director Neil Marshall makes it clear from the outset that The Descent is not going to pull any punches in terms of brutality, and although the second half of the film is drenched in blood, he is not compelled to start the bloodletting too early. He builds tension in the night before the girl’s descent into the caves and again in the caverns themselves before there is even a hint of the Gollum-like creatures.

In fact, Marshall proves that he doesn’t even need the girls’ nightmarish adversaries to make his movie have an impact upon his audience. As soon as they enter the cave the claustrophobia of the tight crawlspaces, the vertigo of the sheer drops, and the effective use of light and dark are all thoroughly unnerving.

The lighting and sound effects are actually one of the movie’s strongest parts. With realism the watchword, daylight is not seen after the group go underground; instead, the only light comes from torches, flares, glow-sticks, and in one scene the light from a camcorder screen. This authenticity immerses the audience wholly, the sounds of the bloody women and their hunters scrabbling and rocks shifting around often being much more informative than vision.

The performances are all impressive, particularly Mendoza and Macdonald’s, and the characters are realised to the extent that they are not the simple cannibal-fodder as is the case in many horror movies. They are all distinguishable and yet are not simple caricatures.

Also unlike in many horror movies, once the pace picks up the thrills are relentless until the climax. The group is often split up into smaller groups, each with problems on their own. When one lot have a brief respite from their latest crisis, Marshall can easily switch to someone else who is having an even worse time.

Unlike the director’s previous work Dog Soldiers, the horror is far more serious with the gory tongue being firmly out of cheek. Fear comes from the surroundings, the flesh-eating inhabitants, and the women themselves as they gradually go mad. It’s often a lot to stomach, but The Descent is an excellently-constructed movie and horror fans should really sink their teeth into it.