1h 40m
Director: Neil Marshall

Sarah is in a horrific car accident which kills her husband and daughter. A year later she goes on a cave exploration adventure with her friends to take her mind off the tragedy which lingers in her mind. Six girls, horror plot, cave exploration, what's not to like.

The performances make it feel like you're watching a perfectly normal group of young women having a fun day out together which adds authenticity to the horror when it starts. Believe me, Neil Marshall doesn't pull his punches and it gets fairly messy before the end. You'll see him play with all manner of phobias throughout the narrative so if you're claustrophobic, don't like the dark or dislike a bit of gore then this probably isn't for you.

Sarah gets stuck and has a bit of a panic attack, all of her distress is really an expression of her grief - the tunnel behind her collapses and traps the girls inside.

They soon begin to realise they're exploring the wrong cave because Juno decided to take them to a more challenging venue which causes serious tension between the group, now they are trapped and no-one is coming to rescue them. It's starting to spiral out of control.

Whereas Juno is a thrill seeker, Sarah is somewhat more safety conscious after her brush with death in the car accident and this builds tension between the two.

Things really start to go bad when Holly slips and breaks her leg. This is when you really start to feel the group cohesion falling apart.

Then they discover they're not alone in those caves. Primitive, underground humanoids are stalking them and by the looks of the skeletal remains they have cannibalistic tendencies, certainly they're meat eaters.

So you see how it's all snowballed? Now they're trapped inside an unknown cave with an injured friend, not sure if they can find their way out in the darkness and to have stumbled into the lair of some primitive race that appears to be on the hunt. Panic ensues. It gets fairly visceral from here on in. There's some tensions in the group as the plot thickens too which add extra stress.

So it gets fairly gritty as the creatures hunt down the group, what started as a lovely day out has collapsed into a brutal and desperate fight to survive and it gets pretty bleak by the end with Sarah lapsing into insanity. I won't spoil anything else for you but you get the idea, Neil Marshall really turns the horror up to 11!

You'll notice a nice track zoom shot at the beginning as Sarah realises her loss in the hospital. This is where you move the camera towards the subject and at the same time you zoom out and has the effect of keeping the character about the same size but changing the depth of field - you'll recognise it from the famous scene in Jaws when Brody realises the kids are being eaten by the shark. Here's the Jaws one (it's 20 seconds in): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5IqRhuz72EE

There's some nice tricks on the creatures too where the film is sped up and it looks like there's a high shutter speed which makes them look glitchy and unnatural. High shutter speed is basically 'sports mode' if you have a modern camera and is usually used to get high exposure when taking pictures or film of fast moving objects - it minimises blur.

There's a few grainy shots which is to be expected when you're shooting in low-light conditions, I gather they went to some trouble to make everything look as natural as possible and they won't spoil your enjoyment of the film.

If you want to go behind the scenes and find out a bit about the actors, sets and prosthetics, here's a link to the featurette on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gqx5snAahzA&list=PL7NI7D_8gjGKVQHrkpC1Kz3xAegkvZi2O

It's a little bit of a horror masterpiece and I highly recommend it. Not for the squeamish but if you have fun with it, there's an alternative ending which you might also enjoy!



Trailer: