The Descent
Damn!
Inspired by Joe R’s horrorthon over on Low Res, I shuffled my Netflix list to move some horror movies to the top, and they began arriving last week, starting with The Descent, and I can’t imagine what it was like to see that in the theater, because just at home on the couch, hidden safely behind the cat (fur + fat = natural supernatural repellent), I was jumping and cringing and “ohhhhh my God”-ing all over the place.
If you haven’t seen it, rent it; it scores high on both the gore and the suspense axes. If you have, more spoiler-ish discussion after the jump.
I think what made this movie work for me is that it does a lot of horror staples well, and does some new things well. Lead character suffers prior trauma that makes her an unreliable narrator? Staple, done well. Said trauma is dispatched with due speed, all third-act guns shown quickly and put away. Lead character is also believed more speedily than usual? That’s different. Lead character does not forgive other lead character’s role in prior trauma, instead literally hamstringing her and leaving her to be torn to death? Yeah, that’s different.
And awesome. And said other lead character, whom we’re meant to suspect, and dislike? We’re also meant to admire, and kind of…like, also! Loved that! It’s not Juno’s fault Sarah’s husband was a prat, it’s not her fault they died in a wreck, and it’s not exactly her fault that she macheted Beth. I mean, it is, but it was an accident. She bears responsibility, but she’s not simplistically evil. She is, however, fierce.
I also really liked that there wasn’t a bunch of pantsing around with the women calling on hidden reserves of strength — there were reserves, but they weren’t hidden. These are climbers, and more importantly modern realistic women in whom screeching in terror and determinedly hacking an old cave lantern, or bludgeoning a subterranean zombie, can successfully co-exist. It isn’t made a big deal of, but no time was wasted with the hoary old “frailly psyched girl goes catatonic in the face of certain doom” trope. I’m sure that happens; I’m pretty sure it would happen to me. I’ve seen it enough times onscreen, though, thanks.
And the twist at the end…I didn’t love the repeated use of the birthday-cake dream until it paid off. It was still a bit on-the-nose, but it worked, and I really liked how long they let the escape sequence go before snapping her back to consciousness.
…If in fact that’s what she snapped back to. I can’t eliminate the possibility that she was actually dying in that sequence, which, if it’s true, is a good rendition of the “An Occurrence At Owl Creek Bridge” twist (see also: Jacob’s Ladder). It’s hard to do that so the viewer becomes the character, i.e. unaware that this “experience” is in fact terminal hypoxia, but when it is done right, I admire it.
I suspect the intent was that she’s merely gone mad, not died, but I would hear arguments. Anyway, it’s not a perfect effort, but it’s very close — brisk pacing, good tonal continuity between the build-up part of the movie and the gore/payoff part (sometimes that can feel like two movies — Shyamalan has trouble with that transition — but not here), better-than-the-norm acting for this genre. Well done, lasses. (And Neil.)
Tags: movies
Hurray! I am also a big fan of this movie. I’m not a huge claustrophobe but this movie certainly brought out my latent fear of small spaces in shivery, quivery, pillow-clutching awesomeness. I felt that the mix of realism with the supernatural was bang on in a way that so few movies achieve these days.
I am really, really disappointed that there’s talk of a sequel. Seriously–where else is there to go with this story? Nowhere.
I totally agree with you. I did see it in the theatre, and it was so scary! I nearly hurt myself with all the scrunching down in the seat and hiding behind my arms and then jumping anyway and knocking my curled up body parts against the armrests and gasping “Jesus!” and whatnot. I’ve found a lot of horror movies sort of boring lately. Sure, jump out and scare you and splatter movies are ok, but The Descent was totally infused with the psychological horror as well as the suspense and the gore. And I did like that there was subtext and character development and nuance, without dragging down the pace.
Sars, Did you watch the US ending or the original UK ending, or both? When I saw it in the theatre, it was just the ending where she’s escaped in the jeep and it goes to black after she “sees” Juno in the rear mirror. (I think that’s how it ends, right?) I suspected that it was not the original ending, and I looked it up online, and found that the original ending was not deemed satisfying to US audiences (or whatever the reasoning is). I could see it. We are used to having our protagonists at least have some hope at the end. The UK ending was bleaker, with it more clear that Sarah is dying in the cave, and her potential escape is in her head. I rented it JUST to see both. I almost bought it, because I was so satisfied with this movie, but I don’t rewatch movies much, so my DVD collection is pretty small.
@Rhiannon, a sequel? Ugh. I hadn’t heard of that yet. I guess they’ll do what other horror movies do… make NEW people come upon the scary caves and do it all over again, but with crappier twists and changes and ultimately they’ll dilute the awesome.
A^3: I read Rhiannon’s comment and was like, “But but but: all dead!” because the version I saw, which is the unrated release, ended with Sarah in the cave, and the escape is clearly a dream/coma sequence. She turns, sees Juno sitting next to her in the passenger seat, and wakes up again on the floor of the cave. I remember thinking, “She climbs out over a hill of bones? Memorable image but maybe a bit much,” and then when it’s a dream, it slots in much better.
But thus my question re: whether she’s already dead — it seems like she could have been reunited with her daughter in death. It’s not entirely clear.
ANY-way: I guess they could wring a sequel out of it if the movie released in the U.S. ends with Sarah still in the jeep, because she’d have gotten out. The version I saw, she’s…not gettin’ out. But still, like hell she’d ever go into a cave again if she HAD lived. This Sarah wouldn’t be going into a basement after that shit, forget it.
For the record: I like the second, longer ending better.
@Sars, yeah… I don’t think they’ll do a sequel with Sarah. Maybe new people end up on their own doomed caving trip there. Maybe they’ll tie up the loose end once and for all for North American audiences by having them come across Sarah’s body decomposing in that final cave area… or maybe they won’t, but hopefully that is the extent to which they do tie it to the original women, because … yeah, no one is left.
I did like the ambiguity of the imagery at the end re the hallucinating vs being reunited with her daughter’s spirit or however you’d characterize it. I actually thought THAT was the more hopeful ending, because what kind of life would Sarah be able to lead surviving all that with her family and best friends all dead by gruesome means? That thought actually haunted me a little after I saw it in the theatre with the trimmed ending.
Wow, I just assumed she was turning into one of the gollums or whatever they were, like, everyone who is tough enough to not get eaten, and is also obsessively damaged by trauma, can turn into a gollum zombie thing. That’s where I assumed they came from.
But terminal hypoxia is, I think, a better explanation and so much more subtle.
I saw it in the theater on a night when a friend and I were at a bookstore and suddenly he popped up and said, “Let’s see a movie.” It was the next one playing, and I’d heard of it, but had no idea what I was in for. I am a person who, if sufficiently terrified, will scream out loud in the theater. Oh, the screaming. With the infrared? On the camcorder? Hoooooly shit.
LOVE this movie. It was one of the first movies we saw on Blu-Ray and it looked and sounded fantastic.
Our movie critic bitched in his review about the ending being the movie’s only huge flaw and he was right; so glad that the DVD didn’t end with the truck bit like it did in theaters because that would have been complete bullshit.
I did take the real ending to mean that she was dying and that she was seeing her daughter as she was going. Spooky as hell and very nicely done.
I wasn’t even watching it myself. I was just in the room while my husband was watching it, and I was still terrified. Great film.
Oh, this film freaked me the hell out. I have two fears: zombies and enclosed spaces, and… close enough.
I thought she was going to turn, too, blnkfrnk, and if there’s a sequel, maybe she’ll be recognisably one of them? …which, I’m dreaming.
Still, ten points to the film – I actually had to stop it, come in and touch base with my partner, grab a beer, and then go back to it.
I didn’t expect to like that movie as much as I did (possibly because I kept thinking that Eli Roth directed it, and I must be the only person alive who thought Hostel was boring. Gross, but boring). And now I wish I’d watched the unrated version, because, well, it sounds like it proved my theories right, and I love when that happens.
God, I hope they never make a sequel. It would likely just be a redoing of the first one, only…not as good, because we’ve seen it already.
Oooooghh. Y’all, even though you clearly enjoyed it (and I’m glad you did), the claustrophobia and the death you describe make me just want to snuggle down to some mindless feel-good classic. Like “Eraserhead” or something. My sister used to go caving with her ex-husband (before the ex-) and had some horrifying experiences, what with once getting [temporarily] trapped in a tiny crawl-through passage and then finding a pile of clothing some git had arranged to look like a body. And the spiders. Alllllll the spiders what likes to live in caves. God help us.
I love the scene where the tough chick says that part of the goal was to explore the cave, and name it after Sarah. Underlines nicely the question of the film: are the monsters real, or is this just what’s inside Sarah’s head?
I also loved that the film was fucking terrifying BEFORE the monsters came onto the scene.
@Omar: I was actually really glad I was watching it on my old-school 23-inch non-HD, non-anything old beater TV that I’ve had since like ’00. My bro is always on me to upgrade, but I was glad I *couldn’t* see everything.
@Lyn: That’s apparently a large-minority opinion — that the entire thing, starting from when she wakes up in hospital, is her coma dream.
Movie scared the living crap out of me. My husband had seen it before, and wanted us to watch it together. I don’t usually watch horror movies because I get nightmares (yeah, yeah, I’m a big wuss, whatever), but this was really well-done acting- and plot-wise, I thought. Good pick!
I loved this movie seriously a LOT, but I have to say that I didn’t like the hamstringing part. I thought it was a little too “the slutty girl gets it” and a little too harsh for Sarah as she was portrayed throughout the movie. Punching Juno in the face? Sure. Heck, even having Juno be injured in some other way and Sarah leaving her die I’m in favor of, but I can’t get behind a protagonist that would intentionally cripple someone and leave her to be devoured by Cave Monsters Of Doooooom!, even if that someone banged her husband and accidentally stabbed her best friend.
Still, that’s a small quibble about an overall excellent movie. In a see of torture porn and bad remakes, The Descent was an actually scary movie, even before the Cave Monsters of Dooooooom! showed up.
Yay!! I loved this film. I didn’t think that hardly anyone else had seen it. We rented it to watch at home and thank goodness. I don’t think I could’ve handled it in a movie theater. It was scary and gory but not so gory that I couldn’t handle looking at the screen. That’s the main reason why I haven’t seen any of the Saw movies (or any other similar movies); I just can’t watch that stuff without my stomach going all queasy.
I really liked that this was with all strong, fearless (well, before those zombie things came along) women. It was nice not having to sit through a movie where the women freak out and do stupid things and have to be rescued by a “big, strong man”.
I am a little sad to find out that there was a different ending. The version I saw ended with her in the car. My husband and I really thought she escaped. Although, we did have the same reaction as A^3 did above. How the hell could she return to normal civilization after going through all that? Yikes!
This movie just totally reinforced my instinct to NEVER go caving. Even before the zombies came out, I was freaked out.
I thought this movie was just ridiculously awful! I was rolling my eyes throughout the entire thing! Dang, maybe I’ve just finally hit the point where I’ve simply seen too MANY movies, because I’ve definitely seen the “trapped in a cave with monsters” movie about 87 bazillion times already, which is one of the main reasons why Descent did nothing for me. Been there, done that. I mean, vicariously anyway! :)
I seem to be a lone voice of dissent – this movie sucked.
Usually I am easily freaked out at horror movies. I’ll jump at almost anything. I really liked this movie until they made it a monster movie, at which point it got silly.
Close up of someone’s face! Gasp! Count down on my fingers…aaaand there’s the monster. It was really impressively predictable. I, who am freaked out by almost anything, left the theater thinking “…eh.”
I adore that movie…even before you see the creatures it’s just so claustrophobic and terrifying. I’d love to watch it again, I’ll have to put it back on my queue.
I love that movie…I think it was scarier before the monsters showed up, but I was so nervous!scared! by then that they still creeped me out. Also, an intense horror movie that replaced gratuitous sex with strong female characters? Awesome!
Loved the movie – the scene where Sarah gets stuck was scary to me as I am a bit claustrophobic.
I had heard that they did not tell the actors what sort of creatures/horrors they were going to face in the cave, and they all seriously freaked out when they showed up….
I saw this on DVD – for some bits I had to turn the sound off. Then I turned the sound off and took my glasses off. Then I turned the sound off, took my glasses off, went into the kitchen and peeped round the door at the silent, blurry, distant screen – and I was STILL terrified!
LOVED this movie. I saw it for the first time at the 2006 Philadelphia Film Festival, which has an awesome cult/horror focus called “Danger After Dark” — I was never a big horror fan until I started going to the film fest and seeing wild, genre-bending horror stuff that played with or totally broke from the boring slasher/monster formulas. I saw The Descent in a packed theater where the whole room hushed and shrieked and jumped at key points, and it was awesome. Glad it’s still awesome in one’s own living room.
Saw it at a pre-release screening (very small room with a VERY large screen = sitting in the third row at a regular movieplex). I had been told “hey, action-y movie with strong female characters!” – and that was (half-wrong and) it.
My husband, a seasoned horror buff, was so shaken that he demanded a drink afterward. My coworker was so relieved when it ended that she laughed hysterically for the next fifteen minutes.
The character brief was right, at least: I think of “The Descent” as a claustrophobic critter movie with six (six? It’s been a while) Lara Crofts. Make that a particularly unrelenting claustrophobic critter movie that violates all kinds of “third-act jolt” &c conventions: After the first big reveal 15 minutes in, you’re jolted every five minutes for the rest of the movie – psychologically exhausting. Throw in the fact that the troglodytes look enough like human men (which is what they are, technically) to trigger all sorts of squicky man-beating-the-sh*t-out-of-a-woman associations, and – I didn’t laugh maniacally or drink afterward, but man, I sympathize with the urges.
Sars, have you seen Marshall’s “Dog Soldiers” yet? Not as good, not by a long shot, but another interesting twist on a fairly standard horror convention. You can see him ironing out devices that pop up in “The Descent” – it’s a solid rental.
Sars: yeah, that theory explains the creepy sequence towards the beginning of the film with the lights at the hospital – unless it was part of some bizarre electriticy saving scheme, why would that even happen if we weren’t already in some way inside Sarah’s head?
My session of the film (Sydney Film Festival) was also pretty electric. When it reached the “pickaxe” scene, there was a general gasp and then one guy’s voice floated clearly above the soundtrack: “this is FUCKED UP!” And – word.
His previous effort – Dog Soldiers – is also notable for it’s lead, Mr. Kevin McKidd! Excellent flick.
I think what freaked me out the most about The Descent was the fact that it could happen. I mean, organisms have been shown to evolve in relatively short periods of time. The troglodytes – for want of a better name – are possible. And for the cavers to enter a non-sanctioned cave, and then get trapped in an unmapped area of said cave, when no authorities no you are there?
No caves for me, thank you very much!
It has been awhile since I watched the DVD, but I believe the audio commentary makes it clear that she’s insane at the end and not dying. I *do* remember the director talking about setting up the scene when the women first see a cave-dweller: He didn’t tell them the creature was to be in the shot, and their screams when it appeared practically at their elbows were absolutely real.
Leslie, that actually ended up backfiring. Basically, the cast got such a fright they ran away, across the set and out of the shot. You can see it in the “making of,” video. It’s quite funny.
I love this movie so much. Not claustrophobic at all here, but the idea of being trapped in a very dark, maze-like setting with hidden monsters is freaky, so it totally got to me anyway. And apart from the scares, I think it has a lot of depth, strong characterization, subtlety, and good writing that adds to the realistic tone of the movie.