Fresh and Exciting

An unexpected masterpiece

It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional

a film so unique, intoxicating and bizarre that it not only demands another viewing, but is also forgivable as a satirical comedy where the jokes eventually take the back seat.

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 .

Except for pornography, there are not many mainstream (in various degrees) movies that expose a man's anus directly on the camera, but should you start counting them this intense Spanish horror movie would serve as a willing starter. And not only does it expose a man's anus, it also dives deep into it.The premise of the movie in speleological terms is quite simple: a group of people - they're not exactly what you'd call young adults, nor are they really friends - goes vacating on some desolate coast where they find an entrance to a cave, go into it to explore it, get lost, and troubles emerge. Although speleologists will object that without a helmet in a cave system through which you need to crawl there's practically nil chance that your head will remain in one piece, but generally they will agree that while if getting lost in complete darkness your doom is sealed, with several handy, sturdy flashlights and even night-vision device your chances are much better.The silence of the speleologists begins, however, when we see a cave not as a cave but as an anus. More precisely, the entrance to the cave as the anus, and the cave system as a whole as the human intestines. This way the logic of the story gains better consistency, and succeeds in sublimating the message of the movie far more thoroughly than if resorting to anything supernatural. In fact, the movie could not be closer to "natural" than it is! It is an act of digestion and excretion, lending the "found video" genre a tight dramaturgic structure : as the process of digestion suggests, what goes in, comes out, which is the optimistic view of the adventure (some might come out again), but before it comes out, it must be eaten and dissolved - the dark horror inside the human intestines.But it is crucial once again to stress the importance of the exposed anus of one of the male characters. It is no coincidence that this anus belongs to the one who will be, firstly, responsible for leading others deep into the cave (intestinal) system, secondly, devouring them, and thirdly, getting stuck himself. For here we are not dealing simply with any intestinal system, but with a system that is human malice.Human malice is - in intestinal terms - digestion gone wrong. It is a cry for freedom (excretion) getting stuck, more specifically, getting stuck in its own devouring mechanism which then produces more excreta and further worsens the condition of constipation. It is a self-defecating program, as it were, that eventually kills its host, in a way literally drowning it in its own excreta: just as the character to whom the anus belongs is the most eager to liberate others from the cave by way of democratic legitimacy (here we can think of the USA liberating other countries under the aegis of democratic consent), so is he also the one who pushes the idea of liberation over the top. He crosses the fine line and turns the noble deed into malice, a constipation just contrary to the excretion (liberation) as the final goal, a retention of excreta that drowns its subject.The importance of the anus belonging to a male rather than a female - after all, inside the cave the hand-held camera catches female behinds many times thus suggesting that the cave-intestinal system might be gender unbiased - lies in the fact that the intestinal system and human malice merge in one specific point, and that is male misogyny. The cave- intestinal system as a speleological-biological environment may be neutral per se, but when infused with male misogyny and chauvinism it becomes a signifier of human malice that is as deeply rooted and dark as intestines/cave themselves. And this provides yet another sharp edge to the message of the movie: if liberating others by the force of democracy may ostensibly be seen as the prerogative of the "enlightened" West (here you might notice the role of flashlights inside the cave), with this misogynous element the liberal-democratic stance comes to transcend this limitation and becomes a far more universal force that can fit any political (and economic, corporate etc.) entity anywhere precisely because of the darkness (and deep rootedness) of misogyny as its constitutive part. In other words, if you find yourself stuck deep inside misogynist intestines (a.k.a. ideology, corporation, profit etc.), beware if you get offered help by the same misogynist in whose intestines you got stuck.

Why Don't They Just Rewind Their Camcorder to find the way back Out of the cave!!?? I'm meant to write 10 lines but it's impossible. I speak some Spanish but this movie is more visual. As soon as i saw Filmax i knew it was going to be as good as Rec. The Spanish have never let me down with original horror regardless of what form it takes. But believe me once you have seen this you will know what i meant by my first sentence! High quality camera-work and excellent ,sometimes too excellent, acting by the protagonists. But it makes you want to climb into the screen and get them out yourself. You will see what i mean!But we have a lot to learn and a long way to go before we can take everyday situations and make them as horrifying as the Spanish are now so frequently doing, and doing damn well!

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.