Rating: C-
Dir: Lachezar Petrov
Star: Ioanna-Isabella Varbanova, Mirella Karabancheva, Galen Naidenov, Teodor Sofroniev
Sadly, Bulgaria’s pristine 100% record in cinema is no more. I suppose, after the unexpected delights of In The Heart of the Machine as my first foray into that country’s output, a let-down was almost inevitable. And here we are: let down. This isn’t terrible, but it doesn’t seem to know what to do with its basic idea. Six young people (largely of the photogenic kind, save for the IT guy, because nerd) go on a hike into the woods. They all work at the same travel agency, and appear to get along well with each other. One of them, Kamen (Naidenov), literally stumbles into a cave and they decide to do a spot of amateur spelunking. Has anyone ever seen a horror film where impromptu caving is not a terrible idea?
This is no exception to the rule. Friction arises almost as soon as the exploration begins, then a collapse cuts off their backward route. Worse, it appears there is a mystical force present in the silence of the cave’s depths, with the unwary explorers experiencing a light, which lets them become privy to each other’s thoughts and memories. As we discover through a series of flashbacks to their time at work, turns out they aren’t so friendly to each other at all. For example, Rado (Sofroniev) has aspirations to become an action actor. But his boss, Lora (Varbanova), unilaterally decides to deny his request to take time off after he gets cast in a film – even after the company owner said it was fine.
Needless to say, this unsolicited honesty quickly starts to turn the part against itself. Unfortunately, it also largely turns the film against itself, because it turns out that these really weren’t very nice people after all. The main exception is Kamen, who is the only one more interested in finding a solution to their predicament and a way out. This is fortunate for him, because the location appears to be that of an ancient trial, testing those who enter the complex for qualities such as courage, altruism, loyalty, etc. Most of his deceitful companions are found rather wanting in these areas, and the cave’s power ensured the person they deceived is (literally) enlightened, while they experience the pain they caused.
The concept kinds feels like an old Star Trek episode, opening with an ominous quote: “If you do not recognize it, it will recognize you. One is the joy of light. The other is the bitterness of tears.” However, perhaps like the title, something appears lost in the translation, particularly a voice-over which occasionally pipes up with cod philosophical observations, such as might have come from whatever is the Bulgarian equivalent of a fortune cookie. It’s somewhat interesting how the facade of civility is gradually stripped away from the characters, and apparently shooting in a real cave (even an implausibly well-lit one!) certainly adds a bit of production value. It just never managed to engage me on more than a surface level.