Fantastico!

Rating: 9/10 (21 September 2006)

Completely out of the blue this film hit horror fans for six, and general movie fans too. The Descent is a movie very much in the tradition of Alien and The Thing and represents probably the best creature horror since The Thing. Director Neil Marshall sets the film up to play on the audiences fears of, the dark, being buried alive, confined spaces, and the unknown. It's a simple idea that Marshall has to put these women down into a cave with merely flashlights and flares to light their way, but as the history of this genre will show you, it's so, so easy to get wrong (The Cave, essentially the Hollywood, and as such less artistic and subtle, version of this). Marshall who did the highly rated comedy horror Dog Soldiers before this, steps up a gear for The Descent, delivering a genuinely creepy and unnerving horror film. The film is brilliantly shot and the use of locales is superb, particularly the antithesis of the wide open Scottish countryside at the films beginning, with the claustrophobic atmosphere of the caves.
The plot follows a group of women, always searching for the next natural high. This year it is caving. One of the women, Sarah, lost her husband and her daughter in a tragic accident the year before, on her way back home after some white water rafting. While the instigator of the ladies adventures, Juno, harbours guilty feelings because she had been having an affair with the husband. So we already know something will come to a head inside the cave between the two, once best friends. The caving starts off okay until a section collapses leaving the (attractive naturally) ladies having to find an alternate route out. As the film progresses it's not only the dangers of the caves terrain that the ladies overcome but also the horrible looking bat people dwelling inside, who naturally have a taste for human flesh.
What makes this film work is the fact that Marshall makes you care about the characters. He gives them all a personality. Similarly the film has no stars in it and there's a surprise factor as you try and guess who'll get picked off and in what order. Similarly it's very atmospheric and well shot, and the score from David Julyan (whose brilliant work in Christopher Nolan's first three movies, I loved) is ambient and suitably indicative of the horror to come. All the cast are excellent, particularly Natalie Mendoza and Shauna MacDonald. Marshall too directs with assurance, and flair, perfectly capturing the caves in much the same way Ridley Scott captured the confines of the ship and it's air ducts in Alien. Marshall is building himself a reputation for doing quality British genre movies, and doing them very well. Lets see if he can keep it up.
All in all the Descent isn't merely a decent movie of its type, it is in fact one of the best of its genre. A film that will continue to garner a cult following. It's a movie that American filmmakers of late have seemingly just viewed as impossible to do with subtlety, and skill and decent acting. Intent to go for cheap and therefore ineffectual scares. The Descent takes time to build up it's tension, and knows when to pull the audience in, only to give them a jolt of pants dampening fear when they least expect it. While the brilliant score from Julyan is anything but schlocky, overwrought and predictable. A brilliant film. ****1/2