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Recovering from a personal trauma, Sarah (Shauna Macdonald) agrees to accompany five female friends on a spelunking trip in South Carolina. The group's take-charge leader, Juno (Natalie Mendoza), gets all six women lost two miles below ground, where cannibalistic cave dwellers await. The Descent was lauded in some quarters as a "progressive" gore film because its protagonists were rugged women not content to die without putting up a fight. We wouldn't go that far, but Neil Marshall's sophomore outing as a horror-film director certainly deserves praise. It's lean and taut, reflecting unusual care in every phase of production. The atavistic "dwellers" are particularly impressive; kudos to the makeup department for creating such horrifying-looking creatures. The gore effects are also convincing, although the best ones aren't seen until late in the game. Clearly, Marshall wanted the horror to build slowly and not overwhelm the audience early on. And he allots more than the usual amount of footage to group dynamics, showing how friendships dissolve and long-submerged feelings come to the surface as the party's situation becomes increasingly desperate. Ed Hulse

All Movie Guide

A group of close female friends on a yearly adventure vacation find themselves trapped and hunted in a series of caves by an unknown force that lurks in the shadows in The Descent, the second horror feature from Dog Soldiers writer/director Neil Marshall. After suffering a devastating car crash one year before, Sarah (Shauna Macdonald) is lured to the States with her friend Beth (Alex Reid) to a special spelunking trip by the fearless Juno (Natalie Mendoza), who abruptly fled from the U.K. after Sarah's accident. Along with two old friends and a new acquaintance of Juno's, the group embark on a cave expedition that takes a turn for the worse after a rock fall leaves them stranded in an uncharted cave with no map and only a handful of supplies to last them the rest of the trip. As tensions arise in the group, they are faced with another danger -- one whose love of the dark is as strong as its lust for blood. Opening to rave reviews in the U.K. in July of 2005, the creature-feature went on to show at the Venice Film Festival and garnered the top prize for Euro feature at Sweden's Fantastic Film Festival. The Descent was picked up for future U.S. distribution by Lion's Gate, whose work was cut out for them considering the tame opening of the similarly-themed stateside production of The Cave in late-August of the same year. Jeremy Wheeler

Product Details

• UPC: 031398206415
• Source: LIONS GATE
• Region Code: 1
• Aspect Ratio: Pre-1954 Standard (1.33.1)
• Presentation: Pan & Scan
• Sound: Dolby Digital Stereo, Dolby Digital Surround EX
• Language: English
• Subtitles: English, Español
• Time: 1:39:00
• Sales Rank: 43,434

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