Director – Neil Marshall – 2005 – UK – Cert. 18 – 99m
*****
A group of female friends go on a caving expedition…which then goes horribly wrong – review originally published in What’s On In London, 2005
Here’s something different: a caving movie. Tough to pull off in terms of production logistics, since you’re dealing with confined spaces, often very small and lacking any light source whatever. Although the (fictional) cave system in question is accessed via the Appalachian mountains, this is a British film made mostly in the studio, where the cave sets were constructed or, in the case of larger spaces, faked by a variety of FX trickery. Amazingly, you never see the join and it all feels incredibly real.
Genre is psychological horror, at least to start with, as a group of female friends go on a caving expedition…which then goes horribly wrong. Mood is set up Dead Calm style via a traumatic car accident in the first few minutes. After that, the tension never lets up. There follows argument, panic, gory injury and more than a few surprises. Defying expectations, the proceedings stubbornly refuse to settle into cliché, keeping you on the edge of your seat right up to an ending which will sit in your mind days afterwards as a subject for discussion.… Read the rest
