Perhaps Michael Gross's "Tremors" character Bert Gummer said it best: "Underground goddamn monsters."
I looked forward to this movie, and I wanted to like it. There are decent things about it. The cast is decent, but it's downhill from there. Take a bit of "Tremors", throw in a dash of "The Descent", thrown in a soupcon of the isolation and claustrophobic feeling of "Underwater", and you have "The Devil Below".
This movie is chocked full of horror movie tropes:
1.) All of the men are greedy, dishonest, arrogant, condescending, sarcastic, or all of the above.
2.) The heroic figures are the women. We get it already. The new John McClain has breasts. Women are smart. Women are courageous. Women are virtuous. They''re all Elektra or Wonder Woman. Sigourney Weaver's Ellen Ripley from the "Alien" movies was bad-ass. I loved her. The concept of the heroic female lead is so over-used and so over done that it reduces the concept to a check-the-box-go-to-cliche for almost every horror movie made.
I thought Jamie Lee Curtis was fantastic in the original "Halloween", and the recent reboot of the franchise. I loved Kristen Stewart in "Underwater". I am not averse to the heroic female lead. It has been done well in some movies. Now, it is so overused that it trivializes the impact that Weaver's Ellen Ripley made in "Alien".
3.) All subterranean creatures in these movies hunt by sound. Again, "Tremors", "The Descent", we get it already.
4.) Hey! Guess what? The black guy dies! How original! Even more original, hs is a Christian man of faith who prays fervently just before he perishes to no avail. We get it already. God is dead. God is helpless before evil. This, too, has been done to death and back again... you know, like Jesus.
My biggest problem with this movie is this. We have a population of subterranean monsters who abduct people, and in a Lovecraftian twist, feed them to their amorphous, enormous god/monster. The people of the small mining town, Shookum Hills, know this. They have formed a secret conspiratorial cabal to keep these monsters in check and contained, and of course, the members of this secret league are hostile to outsiders.
These monsters MUST be contained to the mines below Shookum Hills. This is imperative. They must not be allowed to spread past the gates and electric fences set up by this cabal of locals to confine these creatures. But, the locals are fighting a war of attrition, and they are beginning to lose. When this fact comes to light to one of the outsiders, the bad-ass female lead in the movie, she asks why the locals don't go to the authorities for help. She is told that the locals won't go to the authorities or the military for help because no one will believe them.
Really?
People, locals or otherwise, are disappearing on an alarming, regular basis. The locals can prove this. Anyone who goes near the mines is attacked. An electric fence has been set up to contain these creatures... and the authorities won't believe any of this?
More stupid still, the female lead is given the choice to go outside of Shookum Hills for help, or to stay and join the dwindling forces of the locals. One guess. What does she do?
She stays and joins the locals, even though they're losing ground, even though their resources are dwindling, even though the existence of the creatures and the threat that they represent is eminently provable, even though the military would be much better equipped to deal with a threat that MUST NOT BE ALLOWED TO SPREAD UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES. She chooses to stay. And what is her contribution to the battle? A length of rope, and climbing gear. How utterly heroic... and stupid. The ending absolutely ruined a movie that was already disappointing.
If you have time to kill, are jonesing for a creature feature, and aren't too picky, you might... and I stress MIGHT like this movie.
I looked forward to this movie, and I wanted to like it. There are decent things about it. The cast is decent, but it's downhill from there. Take a bit of "Tremors", throw in a dash of "The Descent", thrown in a soupcon of the isolation and claustrophobic feeling of "Underwater", and you have "The Devil Below".
This movie is chocked full of horror movie tropes:
1.) All of the men are greedy, dishonest, arrogant, condescending, sarcastic, or all of the above.
2.) The heroic figures are the women. We get it already. The new John McClain has breasts. Women are smart. Women are courageous. Women are virtuous. They''re all Elektra or Wonder Woman. Sigourney Weaver's Ellen Ripley from the "Alien" movies was bad-ass. I loved her. The concept of the heroic female lead is so over-used and so over done that it reduces the concept to a check-the-box-go-to-cliche for almost every horror movie made.
I thought Jamie Lee Curtis was fantastic in the original "Halloween", and the recent reboot of the franchise. I loved Kristen Stewart in "Underwater". I am not averse to the heroic female lead. It has been done well in some movies. Now, it is so overused that it trivializes the impact that Weaver's Ellen Ripley made in "Alien".
3.) All subterranean creatures in these movies hunt by sound. Again, "Tremors", "The Descent", we get it already.
4.) Hey! Guess what? The black guy dies! How original! Even more original, hs is a Christian man of faith who prays fervently just before he perishes to no avail. We get it already. God is dead. God is helpless before evil. This, too, has been done to death and back again... you know, like Jesus.
My biggest problem with this movie is this. We have a population of subterranean monsters who abduct people, and in a Lovecraftian twist, feed them to their amorphous, enormous god/monster. The people of the small mining town, Shookum Hills, know this. They have formed a secret conspiratorial cabal to keep these monsters in check and contained, and of course, the members of this secret league are hostile to outsiders.
These monsters MUST be contained to the mines below Shookum Hills. This is imperative. They must not be allowed to spread past the gates and electric fences set up by this cabal of locals to confine these creatures. But, the locals are fighting a war of attrition, and they are beginning to lose. When this fact comes to light to one of the outsiders, the bad-ass female lead in the movie, she asks why the locals don't go to the authorities for help. She is told that the locals won't go to the authorities or the military for help because no one will believe them.
Really?
People, locals or otherwise, are disappearing on an alarming, regular basis. The locals can prove this. Anyone who goes near the mines is attacked. An electric fence has been set up to contain these creatures... and the authorities won't believe any of this?
More stupid still, the female lead is given the choice to go outside of Shookum Hills for help, or to stay and join the dwindling forces of the locals. One guess. What does she do?
She stays and joins the locals, even though they're losing ground, even though their resources are dwindling, even though the existence of the creatures and the threat that they represent is eminently provable, even though the military would be much better equipped to deal with a threat that MUST NOT BE ALLOWED TO SPREAD UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES. She chooses to stay. And what is her contribution to the battle? A length of rope, and climbing gear. How utterly heroic... and stupid. The ending absolutely ruined a movie that was already disappointing.
If you have time to kill, are jonesing for a creature feature, and aren't too picky, you might... and I stress MIGHT like this movie.