The Descent

If you're not already scared of the dark, you just might be after watching Neil Marshall's bloodthirsty follow-up to Dog Soldiers.

Described rather boldly as "Deliverance goes underground", The Descent is a white-knuckle horror which makes good use of its subterranean setting.

Thirtysomething Sarah (Macdonald) suffers a mental breakdown after the deaths of her husband and daughter in a car crash. She barely survived the crash and is haunted by nightmarish memories of that tragic day.

Kidding herself she is coping with the strain, Sarah joins five friends on a caving expedition deep in the Appalachian Mountains, convinced it will help her to reclaim her former life.

Adrenaline junkie Juno (Mendoza) leads the expedition, which also includes Sarah's best friend Beth (Reid), two Scandinavian half-sisters and Juno's headstrong protege.

As the group makes it way through the labyrinthine cave network, disaster strikes - a rockfall blocks the route back to the surface.

To make matters worse, Juno confesses she has brought the team to a previously unexplored cave network - so no-one is coming to rescue them.

Clinging to the hope that there is another exit, the six women push on, oblivious to a race of fearless, carnivorous predators lurking in the darkness, waiting to pounce.

The Descent builds on the raw promise of Dog Soldiers, utilising a bigger budget to deliver plenty of thrills and spills and buckets of gore.

Writer-director Marshall takes advantage of the rugged terrain to sustain the claustrophobia and tension, orchestrating some nice jump-out-ofyour- seat shocks.

He uses the lack of natural lighting to good effect, too. Like the characters, we end up squinting into the darkness, nervously scanning for movement in the inky black.

The visual effects, make-up and prosthetics are very impressive, with a number of icky moments guaranteed to have viewers of a nervous disposition hiding behind their hands.

Performances are strong enough for a film of this genre. But once the killing begins, it's a question of which actress can scream and whimper the loudest.

Sarah's transformation from emotionally-fragile widow into Sigourney Weaver-esque heroine is a tad hard to swallow - almost as much as the convenient lapses in logic.

And Marshall's decision to include a surreal, spiritual coda sits rather uncomfortably with the slash and slaughter of the rest of his picture.