THE DESCENT

Directed and Written by Neil Marshall
Produced by Christian Colson
Cinematography Sam McCurdy
Music by David Julyan
Cast: Shauna Macdonald, Natalie Mendoza, Alex Reid, Saskia Mulder, MyAnna Buring & Nora-Jane Noone

2005/95 mins/Color/DTS
2.35:1 anamorphic/English/UK/PAL Region 2

Review from the Pathé! DVD

http://www.thedescentthemovie.co.uk/

Are you afraid of the dark? You will be...

Six girls in their thirties who loves extreme sports are about to explore a dark cave. What first seems to be yet another adventurous but still planned activity turns to worse when a rocks fall block their exit. Now not only must they find a way out of this maze of tunnels but they also find themselves hunted by fearless, hungry, vicicous and carnivorous predators.

Following his 2002 DOG SOLDIERS, Brit director Neil Marshall is back with the best horror movie of 2005. Forget about George A. Romero's LAND OF THE DEAD or Rob Zombie's THE DEVIL'S REJECTS... in 2005, THE DESCENT is horror! Marshall took two years to write and polish this intense script. If your afraid of the dark, claustrophobic and can't stand unknown creatures who are after your flesh, then this is the movie you should see. I won't be spoiling anything more about this new instant masterpiece, see it for yourself.

In its native UK, the movie maanaged to make some good money... here's in North America Lions Gate picked up the rights (not surprisingly). Hopefully this won't only get a limited (read = no one will see it) theatrical release and then butchered on DVD like most of their recent stuff. For once, I hope they have balls. If Pathé! and Fox could released it uncut and in all its bloody gory glory... then why not here?

Pathé! have released THE DESCENT on DVD in the UK as a superb two disc special edition. First of all, the movie is presented in its original 2.35:1 aspect ratio and it is anamorphic. The image looks simply stunning. The colors are rich and the blacks are deep and perfectly saturated, a necessity for a movie that happens most of the time in the dark. In the audio department, we get both a 5.1 Dolby Digital and a DTS track. Both are loud, crisp and clear. I especially enjoyed the DTS track which really sank me even more into the movie.

On the first disc we get two audio commentary tracks. The first one is with writer/director Neil Marshall and most of the lead female of he movie. They have a great time recollecting all the events behind the making of the movie. The second one is with writer/director Neil Marshall and producer Christian Colson, editor Jon Harris, production designer Simon Bowles and assistant editor Catriona Richardson. Once again, they go into much of the details on the movie. Both are very interesting and a must for fans of this film. English subtitles are also available.

On the second disc we get an excellent 41 minutes Making Of documentary on all the aspect of the making of THE DESCENT. It is intercut with interviews with the lovely cast, marry me Saskia Mulder! We also get tons of behind-the-scenes footages, location scouts, how the gruesome fx were created, the sets and their construction and much more. Please do not watch this before the movie or too much will be spoiled for you. We get 9 deleted/extended scenes. A rather funny 5 minutes collage of bloopers called Out Takes. Cast and crew bios, stills gallery of conceptual arts for the crawlers, behind-the-scenes, film stills and Meg. There's also a couple of very cool storyboards to film comparaison, two trailers and one teaser.

Both disc features very cool cave-ish animated menus which are actually some of the best I have ever seen! The movie is separated in 16 chapters and comes in a transparent keep case with no booklet or inlay card. If there's one horror movie you should see this year, then its this one.

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Review by Kim Dubuisson. All Right Reserved. 2005. ©

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