As Above, So Below (2014)
Certified: 15
Duration: 93 minutes
Directed by: John Erick Dowdle
Starring: Perdita Weeks, Ben Feldman, Edwin Hodge, François Civil, Marion Lambert, Ali Marhyar
KRS Releasing Ltd

As Above, So Below is a found footage movie, showing that this genre’s popularity is not fading away. It cost just $5 million and so far has taken in about $36 million, which is still a healthy return for the investment made.

The Dowdle Brothers, who produced and directed this film, have already had two decent hits in this genre: The Poughkeepsie Tapes (2007) and Quarantine (2008) which they followed with their 2010 hit horror Devil. They are in familiar territory here as they deliver a creepy film that will please fans of the found footage genre while at the same time introducing conspiracy theory elements. In fact, As Above, So Below can be described as a mix between the Da Vinci Code (2006) and Descent (2005).

Perdita Weeks plays Scarlett, an archaeology professor who wants to pay tribute to her late father by finding a magical stone.

She finally gets her hands on a map that will lead her to its hidden location: underneath Paris.

She is joined by her ex-boyfriend George (Ben Feldman) and a whole team of adventurers – she needs George for his translation skills while Papillon (François Civil), a Parisian explorer, and his team can navigate under the French capital.

Starting from the catacombs, the whole venture becomes a sort of dungeon crawl kind of adventure as the group pushes further and further into the earth.

That is when they discover they are moving in areas in which no human has ever dared to and that they may be entering the veritable gates of hell. One by one, the group is picked off while Scarlett and the other survivors start to believe they are going mad.

One of the film’s main attraction is the location, featuring real catacombs beneath Paris. These provide the perfect setting for the suffocating and domineering air that infests the film. It’s this unusual location which gives the picture its weird and unusual haunted house of horrors feel.

The audience is assaulted by images such as a burning car sequence which is positively surreal and souls crying out for aid from the rocks, making everything seem suspicious, scary and out of this world.

Contrary to many other films of the genre, the characters are quite likeable. Weeks makes for a good heroine, Feldman is trustworthy and Edwin Hodge brings a strong sense of personality to the character of Benji.

The mix of Tomb Raider traps, horror clichés and the mythology type of ideas give this film a sense of identity and a different flavour to Paris, which is mostly portrayed as a city of romance.

Despite some of the usual disjointedness that accompanies the genre, the film manages to put the audience through the wringer, which will result in a lot of gasps and sighs.

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