Day Two: The Descent (2006)
We know the structure of most horror films. They are, to borrow an unoriginal metaphor, like mousetraps. The first act or maybe two is the pulling back, the latching. The last act or maybe two is the snap of the spring-the explosion of the tension the filmmaker has, hopefully, artfully set up.
The latching, the snapping into place of the elements that will bite you in the ass later on, is, of course, the most fun part of a great horror movie, and the part the amateurs tend to take the least seriously. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974*) is as good as people say it is, but it set a bad example of the the two act exposition that goes nowhere, that’s almost literally just watching paint dry until the killer shows up, the recent Wolf Creek is an example of this, but there are plenty more.
Even great horror films though, have a bit of nearly unavoidable inevitability, and this can damper the scares (or at least the shock). I’ve never seen a horror film that has a true coitus interruptus, that represents a total invasion, an authentic break from another story that was going on before the horror set in. You never feel that lives are being entered upon and shattered.
Instead, you feel you’re watching a bunch of people waiting for the horror to show up. Imagine a romantic comedy with Meg Ryan, where she’s brutally murdered halfway through after a charming evening of miscommunication with Hugh Grant, that would get people talking. And that would be true horror. People who are murdered in real life, haven’t, normally, been politely advised beforehand.
The Descent is one of the greatest pure visceral boo movies ever made, and, while we know we’re going into a horror movie before the horror starts, it comes about as close to capturing the violation mentioned above of as any film I can recall. Two thirds of The Descent’s running time concerns a group of over-zealous British female adventurers who venture into a cave that’s unmarked and dangerous, and details the humbling that Mother Nature deals as a result. This isn’t marking time, this isn’t a goof. The Descent is a gripping, convincing, claustrophobic, adventure film, all up until minute 55 or so.
The last third?
The last third is possibly the scariest monster movie I’ve ever seen.
But, as effective as Act III is (and its a doozy), much of The Descent’s effect can be credited to that opening hour. Neil Marshall, the writer-director here (this is his second film, after the charming but dorky Dog Soldiers) has talent, but, equally important, he actually gives a shit. He’s steeped in this stuff, the more movie saavy people in the room can play spot the homage, but Marshall doesn’t let his love for horror films past block his desire to contribute to the genre himself.
There’s a scene, about ten minutes before the true menace appears, where the women, convinced they’re trapped, find a map on the wall. They should be slightly happy, or at least buzzing with hope, which has been on short supply. We, as the audience, indulge in a little hope too, and that’s exactly when Marshall allows the primary riff of the score (familiar to anyone who’s seen John Carpenter’s The Thing) to be heard for the first time. It’s one of the great “oh, they are truly fucked” moments the movies have given us.
Marshall’s script should also be commended, as its a bit lighter on its feet than most in the genre. The ladies don’t have a whole lot of individuality, and they tend to fall under the James Cameron Fetish-Macho school of screenwriting, but their inner-relationships are confidently, organically established, with a minimum of fussy, boring exposition. Marshall even works in a betrayal that is shocking and ironic.
The Descent, with its images of people wriggling around in a Hellish underground populated by old, forbidden things, also recalls Henry Kuttner’s short story “The Graveyard Rats”, as well as Stephen King’s “Graveyard Shift**”, which was probably inspired by Kuttner’s story. I remembering reading Kuttner’s story as a child and craving a film that truly captured that dank, terrifying clamminess. Neil Marshall made that movie fifteen years later. And its a classic.
*Damn all these remakes! A horror title can’t be listed without including a year of release anymore.
**The story, not the movie, which leans a bit on the goofy side, though its fun in the right frame of mind.
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