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Neil Marshall, writer and director of The Descent, is probably best known to fans of cult cinema for helming the quirky and unique horror flick Dog Soldiers, which combines dark humor with a fresh (but sufficiently gory) spin on the classic werewolf tale. In The Descent, Marshall takes on more serious themes and a more textured story, combines them with a simple and effective cinematic approach, and officially puts himself on my personal list of directors to watch for.

Following a sudden and tragic accident that comprises the opening of the film, adrenaline junkie Sarah (Shauna McDonald) goes on a spelunking trip with a group of close friends, led by the fiercely independent Juno (Natalie Jackson Mendoza, someone else that I hope we’ll be seeing much more of). The women set out to explore an obscure cave, and Juno, fulfilling the destiny of countless hapless explorers before her, leaves behind the vital guidebook, confident that her skills will be enough. Things turn bad for the group when an unstable cave collapses behind them, leaving them with no way back — and turn worse still when they begin to suspect they may not be alone.

It goes without saying that The Descent is not a movie for the claustrophobic. Nearly the entire run of the film takes place in dark, pressing, underground caverns, shot in extreme close-up with little to no ambient light. If close quarters make you edgy, you are likely to spend most of The Descent squirming. The movie capitalizes brilliantly on its dark and relentless atmosphere, giving the viewer no respite — there are no cut-aways to concerned relatives or unnecessary B-plots. From twenty minutes onward, the film takes place in near-complete darkness, with no relief in sight, and it’s enough to make the viewer uncomfortable in all the ways a horror movie should.

Unfortunately, the biggest and most effective scare of The Descent is blatantly given away by the trailer and commercials, so if you’ve seen any of the promotional materials surrounding the film, you probably know the gag by now. The good news is, the movie is frightening enough without the added twist that comes about halfway through — though that twist deftly changes the nature of the horror, adding to the fright without taking away the stark intensity of being trapped two miles underground. The Descent‘s canny obstacle-stacking reminds me of classic horror thrillers like Aliens, where bigger difficulties chase after smaller ones, relentlessly raising the stakes until the viewer is shrinking back in his chair and madly munching peanuts like Eddie Izzard watching an American movie. (Okay, well, I did both these things, anyway. Your mileage may vary.)

One of the best things about The Descent is that it is actually about something other than gathering a large group of English women together and then systematically killing them off. So many contemporary horror movies simply take a swipe at establishing characters as a passing courtesy before wiping them out in the second reel. While many of the secondary characters of The Descent could easily be labeled as disposable, certain strong characterizations survive the exposition of the film and are carried through to the end — most notably the tension between Sarah and Juno, as the opening sequence subtly implies a romantic rivalry between them without ever openly spelling it out. In addition, the characters undergo a “descent” that is metaphorical as well as physical; in the deadly, unforgiving circumstances in which they find themselves, the characters make decisions which would be brutally amoral by the light of day — but deep underground, in desperate straits, it’s a much different story. Shauna McDonald’s performance as Sarah is particularly transformative, as she gradually turns from a tragic, mousy figure into something far more animalistic and brutal, right down to her body motions and facial expressions.

This level of subtlety and texture, though hardly elevating The Descent to art-house levels, is nearly unheard-of in the today’s horror-movie climate, and it made me want to leap out of my chair and give The Descent a big kiss. Only I didn’t, because it’s bloody and gross and I couldn’t find my flashlight. The Descent is not perfect — I found some of the gore a bit overdone, and a very few plot turns seemed a little contrived, but these are small criticisms in a film that is otherwise one of the best horror films to come along in years. To un-ironically borrow a phrase from horror movie trailers of ages past — this is one to watch with the lights off.

8/10