Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
The story of an all-female caving expedition gone horribly wrong, The Descent (2005) is arguably the best of the mid-2000s horror entries to return verve and intensity to the genre. Unlike its peers (Saw 2004], Hostel 2011], etc.), The Descent was both commercially and critically popular, providing a genuine version of what other films could only produce as pastiche. For Mark Kermode, writing in the Observer, it was -one of the best British horror films of recent years, - and Derek Elley in Variety described it as -an object lesson in making a tightly-budgeted, no-star horror pic.- Time Out's critic praised -this fiercely entertaining British horror movie;- while Rolling Stone's Peter Travers warned prospective viewers to -prepare to be scared senseless.- Emphasizing female characters and camaraderie, The Descent is an ideal springboard for discussing underexplored horror themes: the genre's engagement with the lure of the archaic; the idea of birth as the foundational human trauma and its implications for horror film criticism; and the use of provisional worldviews, or -rubber realities, - in horror.