La cueva

Horror story filled with suspense , relentless terror , nudism , profanity , bad language and lots of gore and blood . This frightening Spanish movie concerns about a young group , being trapped into claustrophobic caves . As a group of 5 friends formed by Marta Castellote as Celia , Xoel Fernández as Carlos , Eva García-Vacas as Begoña , Marcos Ortiz as Jaco and Jorge Páez as Iván gather together on holiday to Island Formentera , in the Balearic Islands . Later on , the group goes for a caving hick . Shortly after , they encounter a cave entrance , which they decide to explore . After some exploring deep underground , the expedition gets horribly worse when they become lost , rockfall collapse and they don't find the dark way out . After delivering further into the cavern , things go awry .

This is one of the cheapest horror movies of the last years and it contains thrills , chills , cannibalism , blood and gore . Regular film features an unknown cast , being shot on location in Formentera, Balearic Islands, Spain . It packs a sinister , realistic and horrifying atmosphere , full of eerie scenes by means of shaky camera as well as the former Spanish film titled ¨REC¨ and followings ; as ¨La Cueva¨ itself is realized in similar premise to the Spanish originals . ¨Alfredo Montero's La Cueva¨ was shot with camera over shoulders , in documentary style and itself takes place from point of sight from cameraman . It was shot in ¨Rec¨ style that was followed by Rec II and Rec III , Genesis , all of them written/produced/directed by Paco Plaza and Jaume Balaguero , two magnificent experts on terror genre . And it had an American remake : ¨Quarantine¨ , a solid film , being continued by ¨Quarantine 2¨ . ¨La Cueva¨ or ¨The cave¨ it is an acceptable movie but mediocre , a so-so terror story plenty of suspense , merciless horror , plenty of screams , shocks and tension and in thrilling style . The film takes parts here and there from other films as ¨The Descent¨(2005) , ¨The Cave¨(2005) and , of course , ¨Rec¨ saga . The horror moments are compactly made and fast-moving in which the brutal instincts of survival of the human beings are well shown , by being seen from the POv of a camera that one of the boys is holding . Well worth seeing if you like videos and shaky cameras , such us : ¨Blair witch project¨, ¨28 Days/Weeks¨ and ¨Cloverfield¨ .

Others films dealing with this sub-genre about people caught in caves are the followings : ¨Sub-human¨ (1972) by Gary Sherman with Donald Pleasence , Norman Rossington , David Ladd ; ¨What wait below¨ (1985) by Don Sharp with Robert Powell , Timothy Bottoms , Lisa Blount , Anne Heywood , Richard Johnson . And recently : ¨The cave¨ by Brian Hunt with Cole Houser , Piper Perabo , Eddie Cibrian , Rick Ravanello ; ¨The descent¨(2005) by Neil Marshall with Alex Reid , Natalie Mendoza , Shauna MacDonald , both them dealing with people caught into caverns and besieged , chased , attacked by packs of carnivorous , bloodthirsty , crawling creatures are waiting for them .

Shot in a 90% Found Footage style, this film goes from being a fun mood trip of 5 friends to becoming absolutely insane and terrifying towards the end. The story is plain simple but execution is top class.

I think in general terms this was a great flick, a very realistic story that begin in a high spirit note straigth to desperation and pure madness, Great acting, I strongly recomend.

A group of five friends are on vacation and they explore a cave. However, they become lost inside, and they must do whatever it takes to survive. This movie shows the grittiness and realism of what can happen if you go into an unexplored and unused cave system. I guess this is like a realistic version of The Decent, but instead of showing trained spelunkers and cave-dwelling monsters, it shows how sadistic people can be when their need to survive outweighs all else. This is filmed mostly through a camcorder.

This movie is entirely in Spanish. I do not speak Spanish very well - I picked up a word here and there - but it was easy enough to follow what was going on. I'm hoping they'll release a dubbed version or at least a version with subtitles. Still, you can catch what's happening without that, though I'm not quite certain how the people became lost; perhaps that was mentioned in the dialogue. There are a few jumps in this, which is usually rare for these types of movies, so that was a welcome surprise.

I gave this a 7-star rating because the acting was very good, especially Marta Castellote. The sets were also cool. The filming, as I said earlier, was done via camcorder, so take that how you want. There is a lot of nudity in the beginning; they have full-frontal of a woman and a man. The storyline wasn't very original, but the movie was executed in a very realistic way. There are NO special effects of any kind. Really, the film didn't need them. If you're looking for a creature feature with special effects and such, watch The Decent. If you're looking for realism, watch this. I recommend it.

While the film balances out a decent dose of realism with ultimate savagery and claustrophobic jumpscares, the director is unable to fully commit to the found-footage format, taking away some of its shine. This is essentially The Descent, minus the flesh-hungry creatures, albeit with a more spontaneous (yet dumb) premise and an emotionally weaker set of key characters. A couple of them, in particular, are incredibly annoying and stupid. But I guess that's how groups in general tend to be.

Cave horror is a reasonably engaging subgenre when tackled correctly, and in that regard, director Alfredo Montero is easily able to bring those anxiety levels up, especially when the characters keep crawling their way through tiny spaces. There are a whole bunch of "getting lost" clichés, but the proceedings kept me interested. Since the whole saga unravels quickly, I wasn't able to fully buy into the group's decision to commit cannibalism to stay alive. In a longer and more emotionally drawn-out film, that plot development would've been the most disturbing. But here, the jumpscares and shaky visuals continue overriding it until the very end.