Horror at a very high level

Rating: 8/10 (26 February 2006)

This film reminded me on a view concepts which were used earlier.. When I began watching I thought about "Open Water", so I prepared myself for a lot of grief and a very nasty feeling throughout the film. As I somewhat expected, the first 45 minutes gave me this feeling.. This feeling was completely reversed in the second half, in which the gore and scares multiply by a factor 10 in a "From Dusk Till Dawn" kind of way..
The story is quite simple. Six girls in their twenties go on a vacation, one year after a tragic accident occurred involving one of them. As a way to move on with their lives, they decide to go on a vacation in which they go cave diving. Panic breaks out when the expected happens, they find out they're in the wrong cave! This first part of the film has an extremely claustrophobic atmosphere which contributes immensely to the suspense..
The second part takes the story to a straightforward horror-level, in which the girls find out that they are not alone.. The cave holds a danger far beyond their imagination and is out to get them.. Although this is quite standard horror stuff, the scares are very effective.. One of the great aspects to generate some of the best scares, is that one of the girls only has a infrared camera to see what's happening.. As the cave is pitch black and the girls get separated from each other, the suspense and gore come together in a nice even way..
There are off course some aspects which I don't like about this movie. The thing that bothered me most is that the girls are presented as being very good close friends. The decisions being made by them are in my opinion very strange.. If you would imagine yourself in their situation with some of your best friends, who could do the things they do? I couldn't, and that is what makes this movie a bit unbelievable..
All this said, my main point here is that this movie should be watched with an open mind, like most horror films.. It's easy to criticize on almost all movies out there and though I do not consider this a classic, it has a higher level than most horror films produced lately.. Very watchable and very enjoyable, this film gets my vote! 7,5/10