(Girl Power Times Six may not be enough for Cave Monsters Times A Hundred)
CAST: Shauna MacDonald, Natalie Mendoza, Alex Reid, Saskia Mulder, MyAnna Buring, Nora-Jane Noone, Oliver Milburne.
DIRECTOR: Neil Marshall
WARNING: Some SPOILERS and six bad-ass chicks going toe-to-toe with 100 butt-ugly cave creatures straight ahead…
Last week, we reviewed THE CAVE (review # 171). It revolved around a team of spelunker/divers who explore a previously uncharted cave system in the Carpathian mountains of Romania. Before long, though, they are trapped by a cave-in and must try to find another way back to surface. Things gets even ickier, when they discover deadly life forms lurking among all the water, stalactites, and stalagmites. Needless to say, these life forms would like nothing more than to keep our wetsuited heroes down in the dark with them.
THE CAVE wasn’t the only film to be released in 2005 about a fight for survival underground. Across the pond in the UK, a little film called THE DESCENT hit theatres - and rapidly became the horror sensation of that year, with some reviews hailing it as “the best horror/thriller since ALIEN” and “spectacularly scary.” Essentially, THE DESCENT has almost exactly the same plot as THE CAVE: a group of six female spelunkers decide to explore a previously uncharted cave system in the Appalachian mountains, only to be trapped by a cave-in. As they try to find another way out, they slowly realize they are not alone in the caves….
There are some distinct differences between THE CAVE and THE DESCENT, though. The former is a glossy and technically well-made film that is occasionally exciting, hardly ever truly frightening, and ultimately disappointing. The latter is a glossy and technically well-made film that is consistently exciting, always truly frightening, and ultimately deeply terrifying. And all of THE DESCENT’s six major characters are strong, capable females. As opposed to THE CAVE, which only had two.
And yes… I agree that THE DESCENT is the best horror/thriller since ALIEN.
Our story opens in Scotland, where we meet two of our six heroines: (1) Juno (Natalie Mendoza), alpha-female American adventurer who is always up for an adrenaline rush; and (2) Sarah (Shauna MacDonald), winsome Scottish adventurer who is always following Juno’s lead. Juno and Sarah are on a rafting trip with Sarah’s husband, Paul (Oliver Milburne), and their daughter, Jessica (Molly Kayll). As they pack up afterwards, we catch Paul and Juno giving each other googley eyes. Sarah doesn’t see this, though, and is blissfully unaware that there might be something going on between her husband and her best friend.
Unfortunately, we don’t have the privilege of that ignorance. As Paul drives Sarah and Jessica back to town, he gets that dreamy look that everyone in love gets when they’ve just seen the person they’re crazy about. Suffice it to say, he’s probably not thinking of Sarah. Unfortunately, this dreamy, googly state he’s in distracts him from the fact that a truck is speeding towards them in the same lane. Result? A head-on collision that kills both Paul and Jessica - and cruelly spares Sarah.
Flash forward a couple of years later, and we find that Sarah had a mental breakdown after the deaths of Paul and Jessica. She has just left the mental hospital, and our third heroine, the fabulously sarcastic Beth (Alex Reid), has decided to whisk Sarah away on a spelunking adventure in the States to help her heal.
In the U.S., Sarah and Beth reconnect with a pensive (ahem) Juno, as well as the rest of our heroines: (1) Rebecca (Saskia Mulder), Dutch hottie who looks like supermodel Karen Mulder’s sister (oh, wait, she actually is played by Karen Mulder‘s sister); (2) Sam (MyAnna Buring), Rebecca’s younger sister who is also fresh out of med school; and (3) Holly (Nora-Jane Noone), Irish firecracker and extreme sports junkie who has bigger balls than most Irishmen I know.
These six lovely ladies have decided to explore the Borum cave system in the Appalachian mountains. After a raunchy girl’s-night-out in a nearby cabin, our hungover heroines get busy with the climbing ropes and pitons, and begin their - ahem - descent into the caves. All goes well until they have to try to squeeze through a passage just a little wider than one of my nostrils. Sure enough, all that wiggling by six hot asses triggers an avalanches that traps our six hot heroines in the cave.
To make matters worse, Juno reveals to Sarah, Beth, Rebecca, Sam, and Holly that she has actually taken them into an uncharted cave system - and not Borum caves. This presents a few problems: (1) Juno filed their travel plan with a destination listed as Borum Caves, which means that (2) when they are declared missing and overdue, the search party will (3) go to Borum caves, where (4) they most definitely are not, meaning (5) they are supremely fucked.
To make matter even worse (if that’s possible), Sarah tells the others that she’s been seeing strange figures just outside the range of their lights, leading them to suspect they’re not alone in this new cave system. Not only do our six lovely ladies have to try to find another way out of these unknown caves, but they also have to figure out what’s making all those strange sounds in the dark.
Is it their imagination? Or are there creatures in the caves with them? If so, are they benign? Or are they murderous? If so, how will our lovely ladies fend them off? Who will make it out of the caves? Who will not? Will Juno pay for tricking her friends into this new, deadly cave system? Will she pay for messing around with Sarah’s husband? What happens when Sarah finds out? Will it impede their fight for survival with yet another conflict? Why do those monsters look like the bastard children of Gollum for the HARRY POTTER series?
Find out for yourselves. Just don’t forget to leave a travel plan with your local rangers. In case you go missing.
BUT, SERIOUSLY: Once every few years, a film comes along that reminds us of just how visceral, cathartic, intelligent, and gripping the horror genre can be. In 2005, that film was THE DESCENT. An undisputed hit in the United Kingdom, it became a modest success here in the U.S., and eventually spawned a decent sequel that, while nowhere near as good as the original, was still leagues ahead of the rest of the horror/thriller output out there.
As I wrote in the intro, THE DESCENT shares some key similarities with THE CAVE. But while THE CAVE was an exercise in flashy and ultimately ineffective horror, THE DESCENT is a prime example of how to create a strong horror film using the classic ingredients: (1) a sympathetic group of characters, (2) a unique and terrifying setting utilized to maximum advantage; and (3) a potent threat that poses a significant hindrance to the characters’ survival.
THE CAVE had all these elements - but fumbled them significantly. THE DESCENT, on the other hand, gets it all right. This is due in no small part to director Neil Marshall, whose past output has shown him to be a director who understands that keeping the danger in the shadows, then gradually revealing it, is far more terrifying than semaphoring and short-handing every single scare. Marshall takes his time in setting up the deadly situation that his heroines find themselves in.
This has a terrific two-fold effect: (1) we get to know Sarah, Juno, Beth, Rebecca, Sam, and Holly as distinct and vivid personalities; and (2) when the horror of the “crawlers” is finally unleashed mid-way through the movie, all the groundwork so carefully laid before-hand makes the revelation genuinely terrifying. In fact, the scene in which one of the “crawlers” first unexpectedly appears directly behind Beth is now a classic. This method of slowly building up the threat while simultaneously shading and developing the characters is the very same approach taken in ALIEN, the film that THE DESCENT is often compared to.
As much as Neil Marshall’s tight script and direction deserves credit for THE DESCENT’s success, though, equal praise must be given to his cast of remarkable women. It’s very rare to see an all-female cast of strong women, especially in the horror genre. But, as one prominent review pointed out at the time of THE DESCENT’s release, it almost seems like Marshall took the heroines from six terrific action/thrillers - and plopped them down in one movie. The result? Six female characters that are all tough, skilled, intelligent, and courageous - yet also possessed of individual shadings, quirks, and fragilities.
Shauna MacDonald does a great job of portraying Sarah’s trauma over losing her family. This doesn’t take away, however, from MacDonald’s vivid portrayal of Sarah’s strength, which is hidden in the depths and comes out under pressure. In fact, Sarah’s character arc is one from docile and vulnerable to feral and dangerous. Marshall and MacDonald take Sarah down some unexpected paths that make her one of the more memorable heroines out there.
Natalie Mendoza’s Juno is equally compelling. Mendoza seems to understand that Juno is a character who hides her feelings behind a coolly tough exterior, and she ably conveys this quality throughout the film. The most significant thing that Juno hides is the love (and affair?) that she had for Sarah’s husband Paul, and Mendoza’s silences do more in expressing this hidden emotion than ten pages of dialogue could. Watch for the scene at the beginning, when Juno and Beth rush to the hospital in the wake of Sarah and Paul’s accident. The devastated look on Juno’s face as she turns and runs away tells us that she’s more destroyed by Paul’s death than by anything else. Natalie Mendoza expresses all of Juno’s buried feelings with expert precision and accuracy.
My favorite character and performer from THE DESCENT, though, is Beth as played by Alex Reid. Beth’s strength is her winningly down-to-earth attitude and sarcastic humor. In the aftermath of Sarah’s tragedy, Beth’s emotional support is what has kept her friend from going over the deep end. Reid turns the character into the kind of gal pal you would want to have by your side: loyal, sensitive, hilarious, tough, and selfless. Reid pulls off this interesting combo and delivers a performance that is both endearing and heart-breaking.
The other three heroines are a little less fleshed-out, but are still vivid and engaging. As the cautious Rebecca, Saskia Mulder is perfectly cast. She has a “big-sister” vibe that instantly marks her as the “Mother Hen” of the group. This quality is also useful in her scenes with MyAnna Buring as her little sister, Sam. Younger and more impetuous, clearly Sam is just testing her boundaries and trying to emerge from her big sister‘s shadow. Buring’s combo of soft and steely effortlessly sells the character. Then there’s Holly, the Irish daredevil whose recklessness leads to some really nasty incidents within the cave. Holly may not get as much screentime as the other five women, but Nora-Jane Noone gives her enough bold strokes to make her register sufficiently as a character.
I should also give special mention to David Julyan’s elegiac and mournful music score. Classy, soulful, sad, terrifying, exciting, sinister, and evocative - it is one of the best film scores I’ve heard in recent years. As with any terrific film score, the music for THE DESCENT never steals attention away from the movie itself, but rather amplifies the terrible emotions and situations that its characters are enduring. It’s right up there with Jerry Goldsmith’s wonderful score for ALIEN.
The comparison with ALIEN is entirely fitting, since both films remind us on a primal level of how afraid we really are of the dark…
