filmed in sets built at Pinewood Studios, near London. The cave was built at Pinewood because filmmakers considered it too dangerous and time-consuming to shoot in an actual cave. Set pieces were reused with care, and filmmakers sought to limit lighting to the sources the characters bring with them into the cave, such as helmet lights. Marshall cited the films The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, The Thing, and Deliverance as influences in establishing tension in The Descent. The director elaborated, "We really wanted to ramp up the tension slowly, unlike all the American horror films you see now. They take it up to 11 in the first few minutes and then simply can't keep it up. We wanted to show all these terrible things in the cave: dark, drowning, claustrophobia. Then, when it couldn't get any worse, make it worse." Marshall also said at the 63rd Venice International Film Festival that he was inspired by Italian horror films of the past, in particular, those by Dario Argento and Lucio Fulci. Simon Bowles designed the maze of caves for The Descent. Reviews credited Bowles: e.g., "Bowles' beautifully designed cave sets conjure a world of subterranean darkness." The film had twenty-one cave sets, built by Rod Vass and his company Armordillo Ltd. using a unique system of polyurethane sprayed rock that was developed for this production. Production of The Descent competed with a big-budget American film that had a similar premise, The Cave. The Descent was originally scheduled to be released in the United Kingdom by November 2005 or February 2006, but The Cave began filming six months before its competitor. The filmmakers of The Descent decided to release their film before The Cave, so they fast-tracked production to be completed by the end of February 2005. Editing The Descent was released in North America with approximately one minute cut from the end. In the American cut, Sarah escapes from the cave and sees Juno, but the film does not cut back to the cave. The 4 August 2006 issue of Entertainment Weekly reported that the ending was trimmed because American viewers did not like its "uber-hopeless finale". Lionsgate marketing chief Tim Palen said, "It's a visceral ride, and by the time you get to the ending you're drained. [Director Neil] Marshall had a number of endings in mind when he shot the film, so he was open [to making a switch]."