Descent: Part 2, The

Stars: Shauna Macdonald, Natalie Mendoza, Gavan Herlihy, Douglas Hodge, Krysten Cummings, MyAnna Buring, Anna Skellern, Joshua Dallas, Nora-Jane Noone, Alex Reid, Michael J Reynolds

Director: Jon Harris

Back to the caves inhabited by flesh-eating 'crawlers' - blind but with acute hearing. Sarah (still Macdonald) seems to have survived the ambiguous ending of the first film, and conveniently lost her memory, so that the 'rescue' team dragging her down to the deep, deep dark to hunt for her original comrades have no knowledge of the dangers awaiting them.

The freshness of the idea has, of course, gone, leaving us with routine 18-certificate blood and gore, as the new 'explorers' inevitably meet a grisly end one by one.

It was tense and gritty the first time round, but now, even though it's efficiently done, we've seen it all before. The baffling, bathetic ending is seemingly contrived more from a desire for shock value than from any logic.

David Quinlan

UK 2009. UK Distributor: Pathé. Colour by deluxe.
94 minutes. Widescreen. UK certificate: 18.

Guidance ratings (out of 3): Sex/nudity 0, Violence/Horror 3, Drugs 0, Swearing 1.

Review date: 29 Nov 2009