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THE DESCENT

“The Descent” is one of the best - and one of the most truly scary - horror films of the past 10 years. It’s really just a very bloody remake of “The Mole People” from 1956, but with a simpler storyline, and more ferocious, visceral scares.

This is a rare example of a good old-fashioned monster movie where the scariest thing in the movie is not the monsters but rather - the environment. “The Descent” isn’t the first movie I’ve seen about people trapped in an underground cave… but no movie has done a better job of freaking me out with that scenario.

The cave is located in a secluded forest with no civilization around for miles. The characters must drive to the middle of nowhere, just to find it. Shortly after they begin exploring, the cave entrance collapses… leaving the group with no choice but to plunge forward through uncharted chambers and unmapped corridors - and just hope there will be another way out, somewhere ahead.

They arrive at a deep, dark place where the only way to continue is to crawl on their bellies through a long, narrow, horizontal tunnel. It’s a tight, cramped little space but they think they can do it. And besides, what other choice do they have? The path behind them is blocked. So out of sheer desperation, they squeeze into this tunnel and start crawling. The tunnel is a tight fit. The ceiling and floor are close enough to bump their helmets and chins. The walls hug their shoulders. The first two girls make it through fine, and keep reminding the nervous third girl to just stay calm, control her breathing, and keep crawling. But just about the time she reaches the halfway point… she gets stuck. She can’t squeeze forward and she can’t squeeze backwards. She starts to panic. We are treated to a few agonizing shots of the panicking girl’s face deep in this tunnel, looking out at her friends, crying and hyperventilating and begging for help.

I’ve never really considered myself claustrophobic, but that scene had me cringing with psychological discomfort! Talk about a movie scene that really touched a nerve!

Later on the monsters show up. They are wonderful, ugly, filthy, nasty monsters. They bring a lot of carnage and violence and mayhem. But there is nothing scarier in the whole movie than that damn tunnel.

I should also mention that “The Descent” has a great visual style. The filmmakers came up with many clever, practical excuses to enhance the mood of various scenes, with savage red light or eerie green glow - via burning torches, helmet-lamps, video cam-corder viewfinders, and hand-held fluorescent tubes. For this illustration, I wanted to draw those terrible subterranean monsters and try to emulate those crazy colored lighting effects. But I didn’t have the nerve to try and depict that tunnel scene. Ha!

Description
THE DESCENT

“The Descent” is one of the best - and one of the most truly scary - horror films of the past 10 years. It’s really just a very bloody remake of “The Mole People” from 1956, but with a simpler storyline, and more ferocious, visceral scares.

This is a rare example of a good old-fashioned monster movie where the scariest thing in the movie is not the monsters but rather - the environment. “The Descent” isn’t the first movie I’ve seen about people trapped in an underground cave… but no movie has done a better job of freaking me out with that scenario.

The cave is located in a secluded forest with no civilization around for miles. The characters must drive to the middle of nowhere, just to find it. Shortly after they begin exploring, the cave entrance collapses… leaving the group with no choice but to plunge forward through uncharted chambers and unmapped corridors - and just hope there will be another way out, somewhere ahead.

They arrive at a deep, dark place where the only way to continue is to crawl on their bellies through a long, narrow, horizontal tunnel. It’s a tight, cramped little space but they think they can do it. And besides, what other choice do they have? The path behind them is blocked. So out of sheer desperation, they squeeze into this tunnel and start crawling. The tunnel is a tight fit. The ceiling and floor are close enough to bump their helmets and chins. The walls hug their shoulders. The first two girls make it through fine, and keep reminding the nervous third girl to just stay calm, control her breathing, and keep crawling. But just about the time she reaches the halfway point… she gets stuck. She can’t squeeze forward and she can’t squeeze backwards. She starts to panic. We are treated to a few agonizing shots of the panicking girl’s face deep in this tunnel, looking out at her friends, crying and hyperventilating and begging for help.

I’ve never really considered myself claustrophobic, but that scene had me cringing with psychological discomfort! Talk about a movie scene that really touched a nerve!

Later on the monsters show up. They are wonderful, ugly, filthy, nasty monsters. They bring a lot of carnage and violence and mayhem. But there is nothing scarier in the whole movie than that damn tunnel.

I should also mention that “The Descent” has a great visual style. The filmmakers came up with many clever, practical excuses to enhance the mood of various scenes, with savage red light or eerie green glow - via burning torches, helmet-lamps, video cam-corder viewfinders, and hand-held fluorescent tubes. For this illustration, I wanted to draw those terrible subterranean monsters and try to emulate those crazy colored lighting effects. But I didn’t have the nerve to try and depict that tunnel scene. Ha!