Just in time for the Halloween season, it’s time to break out the horror cards. Now, everyone knows the classics of the ‘70s, ‘80s, and ‘90s, and every year we add the same films to our same old October movie lists.

ROUTINE, BE GONE: I present to you five horror films from the recent decade that will have you scrambling for the remote and keeping your eyes open – simultaneously – not to mention a little humor thrown in there.

These are five films that you may not readily recognize, but you may have definitely scanned the DVD box cover, or surfed passed it on Netflix or Lovefilm, not knowing the treasures awaiting you…

5. Dead End (2003): A family road trip on Christmas evolves into a hellish nightmare only true horror fans themselves could create. A father, a mother, a daughter, a son, and the daughter’s doting boyfriend endure the ride together, as supernatural disasters and paranoia destroy their sanity. And yet, the supernatural elements never seem to go overboard; the movie truly plays out like a “Twilight Zone” episode, roping you and never letting you breathe, all the while keeping it shrouded in mystery.

The atmospheric cinematography and original score are definitely top notch, but it’s the realistic performance from all actors involve which really deserve the applause. Ray Wise holds it steady as the dad, but it’s Lin Shaye, who has usually been reduced to supporting comedic roles in films like “There’s Something About Mary,” who really shines through. Her insanity is just… incredible, much like this super gem.

4. The Descent (2005): The story of six female friends rock climbing, in the wake of a terrible family tragedy, sets the scene for this rough and tough thriller/horror from director Neil Marshall. As if the claustrophobia of these dark, damp caves weren’t enough, Marshall has to thrown in angry, monstrous humanoid creatures as well. One by one, the women fight off these girl-hungry beasts, learning from their gruesome villains while surviving as far as they can.

The best thing about this movie isn’t the great acting, or fantastic direction, or perfectly horrifying set design – it’s the fact that these women characters are never reduced to your typical horror heroines stereotypes. No big-breasted blondes; no moronic college girls ‘running up the stairs when they should be running out the front door’. These are real women, real friends, in a life-or-death situation.

3. Ginger Snaps (2001): Ginger Snaps is as hilarious as it is bloody and horrific, and biting with social commentary and dark feminine humor. It’s the story of two Goth teenage sisters, Ginger and Bridget, one year apart in age, best friends to the grave. They’re obsessed with darkness, death, and the macabre – until Ginger gets bitten by the town’s pesky werewolf on the night of her first menstrual period, and all womanly hell breaks loose.

A low-budget Canadian production has never looked so good. The two female leads have been trained and perfected; the direction is mortifyingly good with a sick, twisted humor and an eye for gore; the make-up is infused with energy and love from the crew; but most of all, it’s the script, which calls to mind the great girl-slang lingo of “Heathers” from the ‘80s. A dark, fun, and unforgettable werewolf ride.

2. House of the Devil (2009): This film – and by film, I do mean film – is a masterpiece. Filmed in ’09 but set in the late ‘70s / early ‘80s, House of the Devil is the ultimate homage to all of the beautiful, horrifying, and dearly missed Satanic horror films of the era it recreates: The Omen and The Exorcist, among others. It was released in very limited theaters, due to its mighty low budget and zero marketable stars, but because of its awe-inspiring prowess, it grew to be a midnight hit sensation in several big cities.

Jocelyn Donahue is Samantha, your average college girl trying to make a buck. She answers a vague babysitting ad, and her fate is sealed. On this eerie night, Samantha is lured out to the house of the Ulmans, one of the most disturbingly, quietly sinister pairs seen in horror films in years, and the ‘70s-infused terror begins. With a deadly perfect original score to match the era, gorgeous direction and set design, plenty of tricks and treats, and cameos from Dee Wallace Stone, Mary Woronov, and Tom Noonan, you know you’re in for the time of your life.

1. Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon (2005): Behind the Mask makes #1 on this list for its sheer originality. No horror film, or comedy, reached this point of dark hilarity in the past decade. Nothing holds a candle. If this script were produced by some bigger names, it would be one of the biggest cult hits of the decade. It’s filmed in that great mockumentary style, made famous by Rob Reiner and Christopher Guest, and proves to possibly be the best use of the technique yet.

We follow Leslie Vernon, a really sweet, endearing, agile guy on his quest to be the world’s next greatest serial killer. Mind you, this film exists in a world where Freddy, Jason, and Michael Myers were real men whose dirty deeds all took place in the same dimension. Leslie takes us the behind the scenes of his ingenious upcoming murders as he stalks a sad, terrified blonde, and we watch the horror unfold from the point of view of Leslie – and a team of greatly inept grad students, who are way in over their heads. This movie is so inventive, so creative, and so satisfying, I just… I just want to scream. Go out, rent it, and have a great Halloween.

Ross Tipograph is a film buff and Emerson College screenwriting major. When he’s not reviewing movies, he’s writing about costumes for Halloween.

Neil Marshall – who was responsible for The Descent, Doomsday and, most recently, Centurion – is set to return to the horror genre with Underground.

Underground was penned by David Cohen and is “set in the world of gormet underground supper clubs. According to Deadline, the lead character is an ambitious chef who ventures into the terrifying underbelly of extreme cuisine.  Underground will be produced by Ozla Pictures, along with David Cohen and Jeremy Platt.

Further details on the horror-thriller are currently unknown. We’ll be sure to keep you updated.

The day HeyUGuys met Neil Marshall we were still feeling a little bemused by his latest film Centurion.  We’d loved the action, loathed the romance and rather lost track of the narrative somewhere in the hard, cruel, Highland frost (view my review here).  There was no denying, however, that it was an overwhelming accomplishment.  Centurion is a survival thriller set in early AD Britain.  Filmed in the Scottish landscape of the original legend,  it follows the fortunes and misfortunes of the surviving soldiers of the Ninth Legion as they set off in search of their captured General and try to evade the savage attacks of a vengeful Pict tribe…

We were intrigued too, to meet the writer/director who had commanded Sean Pertwee to lose his innards to Dog Soldiers and decreed that the crawlers of The Descent would leave no woman un-eviscerated!  We found a funny, fascinating man with a twinkle of mischief and a passion for his films who, despite a packed publicity schedule, still took us aside at the end of the interview to ask whether HeyUGuys had enjoyed all the splendid ‘80s references in Doomsday!  It is our absolute pleasure to present Neil Marshall:

The Descent was a great and original horror movie made back in 2005 directed by Neil Marshall. It never needed a sequel but Jon Harris decided that he’d made one anyway and I’m pleased to report it’s not too bad. It’s not as good as the original movie but probably was never going to be as the originality was what made the first one so good.

The Descent: Part 2 stars Michael J. Reynolds, Shauna Macdonald, Jessika Williams, Douglas Hodge, Joshua Dallas, Anna Skellern and is set back in the same caves as the first movie where we see the search and rescue team hunting to find the 5 girls who went missing in the first movie. You might remember that at the end the lone survivor is seen running up to a car caked in blood.

We find out at the beginning of part 2 that she has lost her memory and it’s decided that the only way to get her to jog her memory is to take her back down into the caves again!! Obviously this isn’t a good idea considering the darkness and creepy crawley bad guys lurking!

The Descent: Part 2 isn’t too bad a movie. Being stuck down in a claustrophobic hole isn’t my idea of fun (Em and I found this out when doing a caving trip courtesy of Pathe which you can see here). That said, the idea of the movie being claustrophobic is entirely intentional and is executed extremely well. Filing a movie like this one must have been very difficult for Harris and he has to be commended for the way in which it was shot.

Some of the acting was a bit ropey and some of the dialogue the same but if you like a good horror movie and want to find out what happened to the ladies in The Descent, then this is most definitely worth a watch, but i warn you, don’t get too attached to any characters as they may not live to see the light of day.

The Descent: Part 2 is relesed on DVD and Blu Ray 12th April.

Once again Berlin comes up trumps, and the next film we have to look forward from the Centurion director Neil Marshall is the story of a novelist who retreats to a haunted house to complete her latest novel, and whose presence evokes the titular Ghost of Slaughterford.

Marshall is pulling on his Exec Producer trousers and his second unit director on the forthcoming Centurion, Ian D. Fleming is taking the directing reins and the news from Berlin is that UK firm Intandem Films is looking to back the pair’s chiller.

The movie is expected to begin production in June and Fleming and Marshall seem perfectly suited to this dark tale, and Intandem will surely hope to build on the success of Marshall low-budget, effective horror sensibilities with Slaughterford. While the story may be an amalgam of horror staples there’s plenty to look forward to from this film.

THR had the report, and casting is expected to be announced shortly.

When I was asked to cover The Descent: Part 2 for its world premiere, I joked to my fiancé that the eventual junket would be in a cave.  Oh how we laughed.  Three months later I opened an email inviting me on The Descent: Part 2 junket – it was to take place in a cave.

The title of this piece refers to the seven adults who spent a three hour journey to Somerset discreetly freaking out at the idea of climbing into very small, dark places on a gloomy autumn morning.  We were later joined by another journalist and our caving guide.  Fortunately for the sanity of all concerned only one of them was visibly concerned at the prospect of the small, dark and dangerous.

HeyUGuys may appear to the untrained eye to be a band of merry movie men but in fact some of us have never met.  I will never forget the day I met HUG Dave because it was the day I broke my very sensible never engage in activity that requires you to wear a boiler suit rule.  It was the day we went to Goatchurch Cavern…

Our guide, caving expert and jolly enthusiastic fellow, Andy Sparrow advised on the look and location of both the Descent films.  His expertise ensured the quality and authenticity that won the first film such praise.  Indeed he told us that only the most discerning eye could recognise the six girls as novice cavers.  During the drive up we had split into hushed huddles consoling each other that no one would take writers proper caving.  We would, we supposed, wander through echoing chambers looking at stalagmites and stalactites and trying to remember how to remember which was which.  We might be offered, as the email suggested, more adventurous fare if we were game but on the whole it would be a jolly old jolly before we retired to the pub.

I don’t think Andy got the email.

The woodland walk up to the mouth of the cave was brisk and steep ““ a clue that the lazy Londoners were in for a challenging afternoon!  We passed improbably small entrances to cave routes that Andy assured us were regularly used.  The angular twists of the contorted tunnels in The Descent: Part 2 leapt unbidden into my mind.  Dave skipped along oblivious, he hadn’t seen the film yet the poor unsuspecting fool.  Neither had most of the others ““ I had to warn them we were doomed!  *Breathe* my extra huge sweatshirt (all the better for cushioning my fall) was clearly restricting the airflow to my lungs as it crumpled inside my funky yet functional boiler suit.  I had to calm down.  We would be fine.  We were all adults and one of us knew where they were.  How bad could it be?

It was quite bad.

Don’t get me wrong I see now, in hindsight, that it was all it was great fun and it was a grand day out but I had recently seen The Descent: Part 2, the following night I was going to see it again.  I was a woman with Crawlers on my mind (and dying alone in the darkness).  Because we had already done the tourist bit you see, it was smallish and there were spiders but little in the way of Danger of Death.  Two caverns in, we ran out of smallish and smacked straight into very small!

One of the things The Descent: Part 2 does very well is to conjure the handicap a helmet gives you.  I smacked my head so often that day that I remember a constant staccato beat following me around like a tiny drummer boy.  Obviously it is good to have the helmet in place to protect your skull, beauty and brains but each time you strike your head the helmet slips and you lose your line of sight.  It is truly disorientating – sound pinballs underground and without your vision you are utterly lost.  The hysteria Rios feels trapped in a flooded cavern came alive for me as I struggled to keep my head upright in a tight passage and wriggle myself free before I lost sight of the man in front.  The sense of powerlessness is overwhelming.

I had never understood that caving was so three-dimensional.  At times the boulders we lily-padded across came to sharp non-negotiable points at others they dropped swiftly away to nothing.  The physical demands of the actors roles were bashed, bumped and bruised home to us all as elbows, knees and ribs held our tumbling weight.  The need for teamwork was paramount and it was a comfort to have Dave’s enthusiastic grin beaming in my wake or a fellow writer’s foot blocking my fall.  Messing around under the ground seems the quickest possible way to bond with a total stranger.  Management training types should pick up on the benefits ““ and if they don’t all make it back well…win-win.

At the deepest point of our own descent Andy had us turn out our headlights (?) and only then did it really hit home that we were at the mercy of the cave.  It was pitch black.  That phrase is often misused, so to clarify it was a deep visceral enveloping blackness that obscured everything. Though he had been a funny and cheeky guide ““ coaxing us into ever tighter spots and climbs with teasing encouragement – Andy was deadly serious when he told us that every hour of progress you make into a cave adds ten hours to your rescue time.  One of the regular routes he visits takes twelve hours to navigate.  That is a hundred and twenty hour rescue.  Gulp.

The climb out was harder, all of us more serious and determined.  We had each pushed ourselves further than we intended and the overall mood was one of pride and shell shock.  We were tired, bruised and a little sobered I think.  We achieved a great deal on our Grand Day out in Burrington Combe.  One of the “˜squeezes’, The Superman, was a Cirque Du Soleil feat of mind over matter – of “should my knees really bend back that way?“  We did things that English people rarely do sober ““ we encouraged one another.  It was all very satisfying and totally exhausting.

The following evening I bravely attended the multimedia screening of The Descent: Part 2. Another caver was there representing Freud and we exchanged knowing smiles.  “How were you this morning?” she asked “couldn’t raise my arms to wash my hair without weeping” I replied.  “I know what you mean” she said, my fellow survivor.

The Descent Cavers

With huge thanks to Pathe for funding the event and to Tanya at Freud & Charlotte at Substance for organising.

Watch an exclusive clip here and read our review here

You can also see a video taking by the guys over at SciFi.co.uk from the day too here.

Though still only in his early forties Jon Harris has already had a long and impressive career in film.  Having worked as editor on such Brit classics as Layer Cake, Snatch and Starter for Ten and worldwide hits The Descent and Stardust, he is much in demand.  Indeed he most recently worked on the fervently anticipated Kick-Ass alongside Matthew Vaughn.  What would tempt such a man out of the editing suite?  The opportunity to direct The Descent: Part 2. Jon recently spoke to HeyUGuys to tell us more…

HUG: We’d like to start by congratulating you on your directorial debut Jon. The Descent: Part 2 had its World Premiere at Frightfest in Leicester Square and will be released in the UK on 4^th December.  Your first feature film is a reality but does it seem real to you yet?

JH: Thanks very much.  I’m not sure it does feel real at the moment.  I’ve been in some very different situations than I’m used to including introducing the film to 1,300 people at Frightfest.  But everywhere I’ve been people have been so positive and seem to really like the film.

Because I’ve already finished editing another film, Kick-Ass, I’m having to go back and recall everything that went on last year making The Descent: Part 2.  Usually I finish things and don’t look back.  All the interest and anticipation for the film has been very exciting.

How easy has it been to let go of a project over which you have ultimate charge?

JH: The same as any other film really.  You could go on fiddling with them forever but there always comes a time, thankfully, when you simply have to let them go and move on.

The biggest difference with this one is that I’ve been travelling around and introducing the film and talking to audiences and getting their feedback first hand.  I’m obviously much more accountable on this one and people are very interested to know how we went about it.

Again I’m just very grateful that people are aware of the film and we’ve worked very hard to see that they are not let down.

Director Neil Marshall spoke of The Descent as “a perfectly calibrated scare machine“ ““ a description we love.  Unusually the second film picks up very soon after the end of the first, how did you maintain the tension to successfully bridge the two?

JH: Part 2 is a direct continuation but if you were to put the two films together there is definitely a switch of focus at the start of Part 2.  We begin from the point of view of the rescuers who have been searching in vain for the missing girls and are starting to lose hope.  So we drop the audience right into the middle of an already tense scenario.

When Sarah appears she is a mystery to them and to herself.  Part 2 could equally stand alone as we follow them trying to unravel this new mystery.  Hopefully by the end, when all the clues have fallen into place, it feels like the end of a longer story that began with the death of Sarah’s husband and daughter at the start of The Descent.

For HeyUGuys it was an exhilarating experience to watch The Descent: Part 2 at Frightfest ““ the audience were so vocal in their enthusiasm for the film.  How did you react to such a reception?

JH: To be honest I was hiding in the stairwell most of the time.  But the response was just great.  To be accepted and appreciated by that audience in particular was more than I could have hoped for.  If they hadn’t liked it I would have been very disappointed.

I really hope people go and see it in a theatre as that’s really the best way to experience it, huddled in the dark with a bunch of terrified strangers.  A bit like being down there for real.

The best thing about both the Descent films is watching them with an audience because you really get to hear and enjoy their appreciation.  It’s a very nice reward for the hard work. After Frightfest we went and got spectacularly drunk, which I think was the most responsible thing to do in the circumstances.

The Descent was lauded for its girl power, “˜chicks with picks’, attitude.  How difficult was it to inspire the same emotional investment in the characters this time around?

JH: It would have been very contrived to make it all female again but we kept the girl power vibe alive by making it clear that it was the ladies who were more adaptable and savvy in this new environment.

The men, for all their bluster and bravado, are usually the ones that cause more problems than they solve whilst the ladies figure out a bit sooner that stealth and quiet are the keys to survival down there.

This was a great angle because I really wanted the story to be about a small group who all had their own private agendas and split loyalties.  We get to watch them all begin to unravel and turn on each other even before they realise they are about to be attacked by these horrible creatures.

How much of a challenge was it to progress the story and open it up to new characters while staying true to Sarah’s journey?  Did you feel any pressure to innovate unrealistic Crawler powers ““ an end-of-level style boss character perhaps?!

JH: I wasn’t particularly interested in developing the crawlers or learning any more about them.  Neither film is really about them.  They simply exist as part of this hideous environment our human characters find themselves in.  They, coupled with the claustrophobia, are what cause people to react in their most basic fight or flight survival modes.  That’s when you find out what people are really capable of doing, to others or to themselves.

The new characters were introduced around Sarah in ways that would either help or impede her progress.  They are all quite suspicious and wary of her to begin with but gradually it becomes clear to them that she may be the only one who really knows what’s going on. But of course she has no loyalty to the people who dragged her back into this nightmare.  They are potentially as much at risk from her as from the crawlers.

Editor and director have such a close working relationship on a film set and obviously you and Neil collaborated on The Descent.  How did you find the experience of wearing both hats.  Did it make life easier to have total control or did you take editing decisions more personally because you had directed the footage you were cutting?

JH: You’re right, editing decisions were more difficult.  I absolutely got where I needed to be in the end but it took a while to switch roles and achieve the distance I needed.  Editing can be exhilarating when you are solving problems but strangely there’s no satisfaction in solving problems you caused yourself.

But editing is not as lonely as people think.  There’s usually a core of three or four people involved throughout the editing process, a producer or two, a writer, a director and an editor.  I had a very solid team around me.

Many of the original heads of department returned for The Descent:Part 2 and you and producer Christian Colson chose to bring all six girls back together to shoot the camcorder footage.  Why was that continuity such an important ingredient for you?

JH: We had an open-door policy for anyone who worked on the first film and wanted to come back and thankfully everyone wanted to be involved.  An awful lot was tried and tested and learned on the first film in every department and it was good to know everyone had that experience to build from.

As a first time director it was great to be supported by all these people I had met before.  I think it gave them that extra bit of faith knowing that I had edited The Descent that I understood the material and wouldn’t let them down.

Beyond that I wanted the story to be a continuation, not a re-tread.  Finding the camcorder footage was a nice nod to the first film but it’s built in to the story as our new characters begin to piece together the clues and slowly realise what they have got themselves into.

All the girls came back for a day and got into their old costumes and Neil Marshall came in and shot the camcorder footage.  I think it was a strange deja-vu experience for all of them but it really pays off. It’s one of my favourite bits in Part 2 where the two films kind of meet in the middle.

After The Descent: Part 2 you had another reunion of sorts when you returned to work with Matthew Vaughn on his adaptation of Mark Millar’s Kick-Ass.  How has the experience been and is there anything you can divulge about the film at this stage?

JH: I’ve always been very lucky to be asked back to work with people I know as we’ve begun to feel like a company.  I’ve cut four films with Matthew Vaughn now if you include Snatch.  Working on Kick-Ass was like getting into a warm bath after the cold caves.

They showed some clips of Kick Ass at Comic Con which went down very well and then we had a screening on the outskirts of LA a couple of months ago and I have to tell you the roof nearly came off the place.

Finally Jon, we know from speaking with you at Frightfest that your favourite “˜80s movie is The Breakfast Club.  However, since the question is a HeyUGuys interview staple, we’ve given it a Descent twist to end on: Jon Harris, what’s your favourite “˜80s horror film?

JH: I have to say you really caught me off guard with that question at Frightfest.  I’d just done a sort of Q&A to 13,00 people, then I was in the very surreal position of being asked to sign things which was an entirely new experience for me.  I was looking at the room through a fish-eye lens and someone crept up behind me and said “What’s your favourite 80′s film?”  You might as well have asked me what I had for lunch three years ago.

I said the first 80′s film that popped into my head.  Thankfully I didn’t say Dirty Dancing which is my girlfriends favourite.  Now I’ve had time to think I would more likely say Back To The Future or Ferris Buellers’ Day Off.  But if we’re talking horror then it has to be The Thing, hands down.  Or hands off to be precise.

The Descent: Part 2 is in UK cinemas from Dec 4 (previews 2-3 Dec)

Click here to view an exclusive clip and here for our review

Images © 2009 Pathé

The Descent Part 2 has been described as ‘The Feel Sh*t Scared Film of the Decade‘ for a reason and when you see this clip you might start to understand why!

Pathé / Warner Bros Pictures UK have been kind enough to give us an exclusive clip for their latest movie, The Descent Part 2 which is released in cinemas December 4th (with previews on the 2nd & 3rd December). As you’ll see from the clip below, the movie takes you back underground where monsters can be lurking and where the most claustrophobic movie of all time is back for another round!

Synopsis: Shauna Macdonald (Mutant Chronicles, The Descent) returns as Sarah, continuing the story of 2005′s hugely successful horror thriller The Descent, in which a group of young women disappear during a caving trip in the Appalachian Mountains.

Emerging from the cave system alone, distraught and covered in the blood of her missing companions, Sarah is incoherent and half-wild with fear. Sceptical about her account of events and convinced Sarah’s psychosis hides far darker secrets, Sheriff Vaines (Gavan O’Herlihy) doesn’t waste time. Along with his partner Rios (Krysten Cummings), and their cave rescue team Dan (Douglas Hodge), Greg (Joshua Dallas), and Cath (Anna Skellern), Vaines forces Sarah back into the caves to help the rescuers find her friends.

Alongside Macdonald, The Descent: Part 2 also features Natalie Mendoza reprising her role as Juno.  Krysten Cummings, Anna Skellern, Gavan O’Herlihy (Seven Days of Grace), Joshua Dallas (Ghost Machine, “Doctor Who”) and Douglas Hodge (Mansfield Park) also star.

The Descent: Part 2 is written by James McCarthy, J. Blakeson and James Watkins (Eden Lake). The film is produced by Academy Award® winner Christian Colson (Slumdog Millionaire) and Ivana Mackinnon (The Scouting Book for Boys). Neil Marshall who directed the original film serves as executive producer with Paul Smith (The Descent, Slumdog Millionaire).  Previously a well-known editor on films including Kick-Ass, Eden Lake, Stardust and Layer Cake, as well as The Descent; Jon Harris makes his debut as director.

You can find out more about the movie on the official Descent Part two website: http://www.thedescent2.co.uk/

You can buy The Descent (Part I) on DVD and Blu Ray if you either need a catch up or want to watch the original before heading to the cinema. Next week, HeyUGuys blogger, Em will be bringing you her review of the movie plus interviews with director, Jon Harris and you can also find out what happens when HeyUGuys takes a trip caving with Pathé and some other unsuspecting movie journalists!

© 2009 Pathé

According to this new trailer, ‘Critics called Descent, the most terrifying monster movie since Alien’. The caption then says ‘The Daily Star‘ in very small letters. I’m not sure the ‘Daily Star’ speak for all film critics but they got their name on a trailer so good for them! The original Descent for me was a good movie in that it kept me entertained for the 99 minutes in which it ran and had a storyline that we’d not seen before – something which is becoming increasingly rare.
The Descent Part 2 is directed by Jon Harris and stars Shauna Macdonald, Natalie Mendoza, Krysten Cummings, Anna Skellern and Gavan O’Herlihy. The movie premiered at Frightfest last weekend and is HeyUGuys were lucky enough to be there and our review of the evening is here. Our review of the movie itself will follow in the not too distant future. The second installment is due for release in the UK December 4th. Read on for the synopsis and trailer.

Shauna Macdonald (Mutant Chronicles, The Descent) returns as Sarah, continuing the story of 2005′s hugely successful horror thriller The Descent, in which a group of young women disappear during a caving trip in the Appalachian Mountains.

Emerging from the cave system alone, distraught and covered in the blood of her missing companions, Sarah is incoherent and half-wild with fear. Sceptical about her account of events and convinced Sarah’s psychosis hides far darker secrets, Sheriff Vaines (Gavan O’Herlihy) doesn’t waste time. Along with his partner Rios (Krysten Cummings), and their cave rescue team Dan (Douglas Hodge), Greg (Joshua Dallas), and Cath (Anna Skellern), Vaines forces Sarah back into the caves to help the rescuers find her friends.

Alongside Macdonald, The Descent: Part 2 also features Natalie Mendoza reprising her role as Juno. Krysten Cummings, Anna Skellern, Gavan O’Herlihy (Seven Days of Grace), Joshua Dallas (Ghost Machine, “Doctor Who”) and Douglas Hodge (Mansfield Park) also star.

The Descent: Part 2 is written by James McCarthy, J. Blakeson and James Watkins (Eden Lake). The film is produced by Academy Award® winner Christian Colson (Slumdog Millionaire) and Ivana Mackinnon (The Scouting Book for Boys). Neil Marshall who directed the original film serves as executive producer with Paul Smith (The Descent, Slumdog Millionaire). Previously a well-known editor on films including Kick-Ass, Eden Lake, Stardust and Layer Cake, as well as The Descent; Jon Harris makes his debut as director.