Head down into hell - twice - with 'The Descent'

‘The Descent’ and ‘The Descent Part 2’ tap into some of our deepest fears… plus, cannibal monsters.

Catch ‘The Descent’ and ‘The Descent Part 2’ back to back on NITV. Source: Distributor

The Descent (2005) exploits some of our deepest fears such as claustrophobia, the dark and the death of loved ones. Oh, and there’s the added terror of cannibalistic underground dwellers known as “crawlers”.

English writer/director Neil Marshall – who delighted audiences with his 2002 werewolf epic Dog Soldiers – brings all these elements together to give us one of the most knuckle-whitening, harrowing, blood-drenched flicks of the 21st century.

But how does the 2009 sequel, which Marshall produced, stack up next to the original classic? Horror fans can make that decision for themselves as both films screen back to back from 9.10pm, Friday 7 April on NITV.

The Descent

Juno (Natalie Mendoza) and Rebecca (Saskia Mulder) in ‘The Descent’. Source: Alex Bailey

The Descent begins with a prologue set in Scotland with three extreme sports-loving friends – Sarah (Shauna Macdonald), Juno (Natalie Mendoza) and Beth (Alex Reid) – whitewater rafting while Sarah’s husband Paul (Oliver Milburn) and daughter Jessica (Molly Kayll) look on. But Sarah’s world is ripped apart when, on the trip home, their car is involved in a head-on collision with another vehicle and both Paul and Jessica are killed.

We then jump forward a year to the Appalachian Mountains in North Carolina where Sarah and Beth are driving to a remote cabin to join Juno and three other friends – Sam (MyAnna Buring), Rebecca (Saskia Mulder) and Holly (Nora-Jane Noone) – for a caving adventure. It’s made clear that Sarah is still traumatised and on some form of medication. You’d think making her crawl through cramped cave tunnels wouldn’t be the best therapy in the world. And you’d be right.

The sextet set off for a fun day of spelunking but not before Rebecca gives Sarah a cheery warning about what could go wrong underground: “You can get dehydration, disorientation, claustrophobia, panic attacks, paranoia, hallucinations, visual and aural deterioration.”

And quicker than you can say, “Foreshadowing!” things go pear-shaped after a rock passage collapses, trapping the group underground. Holly is seriously injured when she plummets down an unexpected hole. They also discover that Juno has misled the group and taken them to a previously unexplored cave system, so would-be rescuers won’t know where they are.

“What I set out to do was to make the cave itself a threat, building suspense in the cave,” Marshall has explained in an interview. “There are so many ways that you can die down there. There are so many threats and challenges, whether it be claustrophobia or drowning or heights and I thought let’s milk that for all it’s worth.” But the caves are the least of their problems when the group is set upon by its humanoid inhabitants, the crawlers.

Struggling with her PTSD during the first part of the movie, Sarah quickly emerges as the strongest of her rapidly dwindling group of friends, as she’s forced to do some truly terrible things to survive against the subterraneans with a taste for human flesh.

The crawlers are the stuff of nightmares. They constantly pop up unexpectedly – if you hate jump scares, then you’ll hate this film. Blind, the vicious albino predators hunt by sound, which leads to several tense scenes as the women act like statues while the monsters crawl and glide past mere inches away from them. When they do attack, the crawlers use their razor-sharp fangs and claws with lethal consequences.

Different versions of the ending were shot for the US and UK markets. Director Neil Marshall’s original and preferred conclusion appears in the UK version (the one screening on NITV). In that version, Sarah achieves some closure.  

But with the movie’s financial success, a sequel was inevitable, with executive producer Marshall handing the directorial reins to Jon Harris, who was The Descent’s editor.

The Descent Part 2

Back for ‘The Descent Part 2’. Source: Distributor

Set two days after the events of the first film, Part 2 delivers on the gore and grossness, although some set-pieces with the crawlers feel like retreads. It also messes with the all-women dynamic that worked so well in the original. Instead, we have a 50-50 split of males and females on the six-person rescue team that heads underground to find the missing cavers. Which is a BAD IDEA.

The team includes the obligatory stubborn older male cop, Sheriff Vaines (Gavan O’Herlihy). Early on, he’s told by a fellow rescuer that firing his gun could cause a cave-in… so you know Vaines is going to do just that when he comes face to face with a crawler.

Part 2’s final stanza mirrors the first film with the survivors battling a horde of monsters blocking their path to the cave mouth and freedom. But even after this we’re given one cruel final twist in the tail that leaves the door open for another sequel (or threequel, if you prefer).

But not if Neil Marshall can help it.

“I could revisit [the world of The Descent] but it was kind of intended to be a one-off. And then the sequel got made anyway,” he says in an interview with Bloody Disgusting from earlier this year. “I can’t see me revisiting that world.”

Which is fine – two trips to hell are more than enough.

 

The Descent screens on Friday 7 April at 9:10pm on NITV (Streaming after at SBS On Demand)
The Descent Part II screens on Friday 7 April at 10:55pm on NITV (No catch-up at SBS On Demand)