10/02/10 - The Descent

The Descent (2005, 100 min)
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0435625/

The first watch of October is The Descent. This is a relatively recent film from only 2005 but one for which I'd heard lots of praise. I found out there were two versions so I checked out the unrated director's cut which was supposedly darker at the end.

The film stars a group of girls that go spelunking. When the cave collapses they have to find a way out while being chased by humanlike creatures only known as Crawlers in the credits. The group of girls is really quite large but only two feature prominently: Shauna Macdonald as Sarah and Natalie Jackson Mendoza as Juno.

There was a lot that this film did right and a lot that it did wrong. First off, is the biggest issue here and that's one that haunts a lot of horror movies: the unknown. Which half of The Descent is better: before the Crawlers show up or after? For me, I think the unknown is inherently scarier. This is personal preference. Also, issues grounded firmly in the real world are scarier to me, but I believe this view is much more shared. Sometimes a movie comes along like Alien though where an otherworldly creature can still cause immense fear and dread. Anyway, for The Descent, the first half of the movie relies on fears of claustrophobia as the group goes deeper into the cave. Once the cave collapses there's an added tension that I really liked. There's also a really cool action scene where a girl has to swing across a huge area in the cave, basically scaling the ceiling as she sets up a line for the other girls to use as they swing across. Everything I've mentioned until now is fearful and tense without the use of monsters. There's some underlying notion in the movie at this point though that the group isn't alone. This sort of works and it sort of doesn't. I'm quite aware that there's going to be "things" in the cave later on in the movie, but these shadows and stuff work really well as they wait quite a long time to actually show a creature (fully at least). This build up works pretty well in my opinion.

However, my complaints begin once the Crawlers are introduced. Sure, they're pretty scary and ruthless as they attack relentlessly, but they also change the whole feel of the movie. The movie takes on almost an action vibe from here on out as the group is split up but fighting these things in practically every scene. This dread and fear from the movie is lost. Sometimes this can work, when a movie changes feels halfway through as it explores different issues. Again for this movie, I'm split on this issue. First off, the action scenes are well done so I have no complaints there. My real complaint is that the movie was working with the approach it was taking, so why didn't it just stay like that? I think it would have ended up better, but I'm not saying the approach taken caused the film to fail or anything. All in all, these are some things that plague many horror movies so it's not like The Descent is alone here.

I'd also like to point out some other issues. One in particular is the predominantly female cast. The only guys in the movie are the one guy at the beginning and the guys that play the Crawlers but they don't really count. Anyway, I think having an all female cast works really well for this movie. I've stated before how I feel that females fundamentally work better as leads in horror movies and I think that females with issues that they're trying to work out in their personal lives work even better for horror leads. This is what's happening here with Juno and Sarah. However, again I'm divided - I think there's just too many females here. After a while they all just seem to blend together. I remember there's a short haired punk girl, there's the most attractive one, there's Sarah who is the lead, and there's the Asian Juno. There's a couple of other British girls there but like I said, it's hard for me to distinguish one from the other here. Maybe knocking out one or two of them would've made the group a little easier to follow. It's not like there's any character development outside of Sarah and Juno anyway. Next, my other issue is with one aspect of the caves. First off, the caves are really tight and narrow with barely any space to move around in but after the cave collapses everything seems to open up. One thing here is that this ever so conveniently happens right after the punk chick breaks her leg. It'd be quite difficult having to maneuver her around in the tight spaces they'd previously conversed so everything just becomes more open. It also works as it sets up more space for the action fights between the girls and the Crawlers. I guess the explanation here is that stuff is now more in the center of the cave so it's more open or something but I don't buy this. It's really just for the plot's sake (and general laziness I feel) and I somewhat take issue with this.

Finally, there's the ending. I mentioned at the start that I picked the darker ending. Here, Sarah escapes but only in a dream. She's actually still stuck in the cave with little hope of survival. It's a hopeless final shot as we see her sitting there and we know that her death is just a matter of time. This is also a realistic ending. Sarah is stuck in a cave that she has zero knowledge of so letting her get out wouldn't really make any sense. I'm glad I picked this ending.

Overall, I gave this film a 7/10. The Descent tries to capture both a claustrophobia feeling and an intense action vibe through its mainly female cast. It really boils down to the fact that the movie succeeds much more than it fails. I have some quibbles here and there and some things I was divided on, but I can't say that The Descent wasn't quite gripping and tense. I was pretty surprised at how much I liked it.