Descent, The
This is one surprisingly creepy little thriller.
After a shocking opening scene the film takes the Wolf Creek ‘calm before the storm’ approach into the almost purposefully mundane as we see the all female cast of characters basically hang out and head off on their cave exploration expedition, with nary a hint of the horrors to come.
Sure, I was bored at times, my mind wandered and when I was paying attention the characters and their around-the-world array of accents annoyed me, but its all par for the course here as the gang wander unknowingly into a nest of horrific nasties.
From here it’s a pretty relentless assault as the claustrophobia of the caves, scarce lighting, and shaky camera work make for a gripping and chilling climax. Most effective is one character’s use of the night-vision on their camcorder to see in the tunnels – everything always looks creepier like that (insert Paris Hilton sex tape joke here). Even tho I couldn’t tell what was going on half the time the action horror was still rockin.
What I really enjoyed about this is that the film doesn’t stop for a second to try and explain the creatures. They’re there. They’re evil. They’re hungry. There’s a strong Aliens vibe about much of the second half – and not just because of the strong-willed tough-as-nails arse-kicking female characters – but then again I see Aliens in just about every monster film. Tack on an interestingly confusing ending (No idea what that meant. Was she dreaming she was free when she was gonna die? Or was she free and dreaming of dying to be with her daughter? Or were there no monsters and she killed all her friends?) and you’ve got one of the coolest indie monster-horrors since the first Jeepers Creepers.