Descent is a new movie opening August 10, starring Rosario Dawson as a promising college student who is attacked and through her own exploration of the degradation, she descends into a hell of her own making as she seeks revenge, retaliation and vengence against a crime committed against her.
The feature debut of co-writer/ director/producer Talia Lugacy, Descent is a film that unnervingly tackles some of the country’s most taboo subjects. Taboo subjects doesn’t begin to tell you enough about the film. This is film noir in its most literal sense. Most of the movie is done with very dark lighting. Sometimes you aren’t sure what yuo are seeing. It’s that weird and hard to watch because on a BIG screen (and I saw it on a screener on a wide screen tv), it’s going to POP out at you.
It’s also film noir in the essence as well as revenge, degradation and “sins” of all kinds that lead the character MAYA on her descent to hell. While supposedly the guys can’t resist Maya’s beauty and personality,
Dawson’s persona on-screen doesn’t show that off that well — at least NOT in the dark. (turn up the lights so we can see her please) . She’s about to graduate and she has a great career ahead of her yet she wants and needs more. She meets Jared whose life seems just a bit too easy and carefreel. Call me callus, call me cynical but this is the kid that really thinks he’s “all that” and more.
The two begin to flirt and date but on one night things move too far too fast and Maya tries to pull away but he won’t stop. She says no and he won’t stop.
After being violated, Maya begins her transformation and DESCENT into the oblivionand what seems to be the hell of her life and the sole source of her salvation would be her revenge on her rapist. She graduates from school and the film distinctly puts her at a distance to show the distance she feels from the reality of what’s going on around her to the reality that is going on inside herself.
She changes the locations where she hangs out, the people she is friends with, the things she does which includes drugs and sleeping with a few select people. Quiet and elusive by day, she becomes a nocturnal creature who seeks solace– yet knows not where.
She enters the new semester transformed: bold and dynamic in a world that suddenly seems small and protected to her. She vows vengeance on her attacker. She will be in control. Yet in seeking her revenge, her solace, asserting her control, things spin OUT of control and in her quest for retaliation, she has lost her way and as the attacker is himself attacked, she weeps as she realizes how lost she is.
End film.
This film probably is rated R and should be X for frontal nudity, graphic violence, violence against women, drug use, language, violence, rape and more.. so much more that you might find it appalling. At the point when there is a rape, why doesn’t the victim call the police? Why not go to the hospital? Why stand there and take it on alone?
I found it appalling. The lack of clarity because of the darkness makes the descent into hell that much more real and yet it’s gone too far over the edge– there are lines and I believe that the character and the director went too far in this story– both have lost control.
Be aware these are my opinions and I feel very strongly that Dawson is a great actress. Others in the film are good but you can’t even figure out who they are or much what they look like because of the lighting until the very last sequence
Stevie Wilson
