The Descent: Part 2

Elegiac and poignant are not adjectives one expects to read in a review for a horror film, but the sequel to Neil Marshall's brilliant 2005 horror film The Descent does something interesting in playing off the events of the first film in order to evoke these emotions. Sure the film is a fun, often flawed Friday-night horror flick, but it's also trying to be something more than that – and even though there's not quite the same amount of character development as the original to give weight to the peril and mayhem the characters go through – for a 90 minute sequel director Jon Harris should be given some credit for almost making the film a success. There are pay-offs in the film that don't work, repetitive set pieces, and an ending that is atrociously bad; however, warts and all, The Descent: Part 2 is still a visceral experience that outdoes anything we've seen from the genre since Marshall's original film, and it even slows down for a few moments so that the story can compound on the sadness from the first film, all culminating in making this sequel a better horror experience than its straight-to-DVD American release would suggest.

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What the bloody hell?

Me too Shauna...me too.

No...this isn't a rant against the Academy Awards expanding from five nominations for best picture to ten. No, I figured I'd take this opportunity to rant about something else that may be news to some, but came as a surprise to me. In my usual random web searching I decided to see when The Descent, one of the best horror films ever made, was released, and to my shock and horror I found that there is a sequel set to be released in September. The above still is one of a handful of images that has been released in promotion for the new film. Ugh, I feel like screaming, too. Complaints after the jump...

Okay...did the filmmakers think that fans of the movie didn't see the original British version of the movie on DVD? A version, although ambiguous, made a great case for the fact that Sarah didn't make it out alive (The U.S. version ends with her "escape" whereas the U.K. version cuts back to reality and Sarah in the cave with no exit in sight). Also, on the IMDB page they show that the character of Juno is once again in the film. In case you forgot she was left to be eaten by the "crawlers"...so does this suggest then that the whole thing was in her head, that the allusion to the idea that the caves can play tricks on you is actually what happened? But then how do they explain the fact that they are bringing the "crawlers" back in the sequel, and supposedly they have evolved further and can fly now. Double ugh.

Neil Marshall's name is nowhere near this film, and I'm wondering why Shauna MacDonald agreed to do the film again. This will be a disaster if they just do a straight horror. And based on the plot synopsis, and the early images that were released, the film looks like it's just going to be a rehash of the first film: Sarah is rescued, she goes to a hospital, goes back down in the cave to save her friends who are apparently still alive. Again, this all suggests that the "crawlers" were indeed figments of their imaginations (especially Sarah who is a grieving mother and widow, and hints at the fact, early on in the film, that she may not be ready to move on with her life), but if that is the case, and the sequel is primarily psychological horror, then why the need to bring back the "crawlers"? And why make them so visible? They were more or less shadow creatures in the first film, and they came into the plot at a point where the characters would most likely have started hallucinating. The best part of the original is the reading that they all killed each other and imagined the "crawlers". The idea of a sequel with the same characters and the same scenario makes no sense.

I guess one could chalk this up to flattery through imitation, but man this is going to be rough to sit through with an open mind...because yes, I will see it, just like I do with any horror film or any sequel to a film I love. However, this has "bad idea" written all over it. The logic seems all over the place here as they seem to be disregarding any kind of psychological aspect that was clearly at the forefront of Marshall's film; and the fact that they're asking the audience to disregard the darker, nihilistic ending of the original is already putting the sequel in a pretty big hole. The power and poignancy of that final image of Sarah looking at her daughter, then as the camera pulls back they show Sarah looking at nothing (suggesting everything was in her head), is neutered now because of this unnecessary sequel.

And it's not like I'm anti-sequel, I just don't understand the logic in making a sequel to a movie where they totally disregard the elements of narrative that made the original so creepy. Perhaps this will be like what Aliens was to Alien, a pedal-to-the-floor action/horror hybrid that was all kinds of entertaining goodness...who knows, but it'll have to be pretty damn intense and impressive to make me forget about the fact that they're pretty much disregarding the end of the original film.

I don't know...maybe I'm too much of a fan of the original to think anything good can come out of the sequel, but it just seems altogether superfluous. Oh well...I guess more thoughts on this in September. This makes me want to find an old essay I wrote in college (published no less!) about the state of horror films...I guess we horror fans, and fans of the original film, play the waiting game.

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