Halloween Horror: Deep Rising (1998)

A final deep dive into the ocean again to view a film of deep horror and such.

Let us return to simpler times in the year 1998.

Our course is plotted and be prepared as it is “Full scream ahead” and “This ain’t no pleasure cruise.” (as the movie taglines state). Let our journey begin.

I give you Deep Rising.

PLOT

The Arognautica is the best, biggest, most expensive, luxurious and all the other descriptors cruise ship in the world. It is taking its maiden voyage full of fancy dressed patrons (who are probably Monopoly man rich based on their look and attire).

Jump over to a small boat speeding through the night. The captain is one John Finnegan, who is not Han Solo, but is totally supposed to be Han Solo. He is transporting a bad of shady stereotypes, lead by one Mr. Hanover, to an undisclosed location somewhere out in the ocean. He is getting paid so he does not care who or what they are about. Why? Well because as long as they pay him and leave his crew alone he does not care.

Back on the Argonautica, one Trillion St. James ( by the gods did I really just hear and type that name??) is a sexy and sultry pickpocket. She is off to rob the Aronautica's patrons and the small room of safety deposit boxes that this boat has for some insane reason.

Next comes the act of a faceless saboteur on the poorly named cruise ship. I guess they want to stop it dead in the water for some reason. it is achieved by breaking CD's from the ship's computer or some nonsense. The boat stops abruptly.

Trillion is nabbed while trying to rob the bank vault on the boat and tossed in the "brig", which is a fridge full of food?

Finnegan discovers that the goons he is transporting are armed with really cool guns, some torpedoes and bad attitudes. They soon arrive at the desired location a giant boat sitting still in the middle of the ocean. Well look at that! The Aronautica! Hanover and his stereotype goons board the ship to rob it......but they find it devoid of people, flooded in parts, full of strange noises and occasionally bloody remnants. What happened?

Well soon enough that is answered!

The goon squad is slowly picked off by an unseen menace in the water. Trillion St. James is found freed to become the Leia to Finnegan's Han. The Argonautica owner is found and was the one to stop the ship and hire Hanover to scuttle it for the insurance money.Well this all exciting and all that, but what about the goons that were killed? What happened there?

Well we soon discover that a bunch of bitey tentacles are moving through the ship. They are grabbing people and gobbling them up. It seems that the ship is infested with these and they are responsible for eating the crew, patrons and now the cast of thieving goons. These "things" grab a victim, swallow them, basically drink them and then barf out a slimy skeleton and extra bits. Expect a lot of grabbing and pulling of people backwards once the monsters arrive. Well that and chase scenes of grates and pipes bursting and giant CGI tentacle snakes slithering quickly down hallways. It all seems like shots from various films I have seen over the years.

Anyway....Now Finnegan, Trillion and a handful of others have to try and escape with their lives and eventually face down the tentacle monsters. Who will survive? Who really cares? What are these tentacle creatures and what are they attached too?

What am I watching? Is it horror? Is it action? Is it a heist movie? Is it a comedy?

We found the crew and guests!

Great movie guns...but who throws a shoe?
Really?

STAR POWER

Treat Williams...he has been "that guy" in a bunch of movies, but never really a leading role type of guy

Wes Studi.... who is never bad in anything, but I know him from Last of the Mohicans, Heat and Dances with Wolves

Djimon Hounsou..... who was just off Amistad and has bit roles in a lot of films, most recently Guardians of the Galaxy

Anthony Heald...another "that guy" he was the Silence of the Lambs as the looney bin Doctor/Warden

Famke Janssen.... well the first three X-Men movies and Goldeneye

Kevin O’Connor....um....the 90's Mummy movie

Jason Flemyng...Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels (a personal favorite of mine), League of Extraordinary Gentlemen

Cliff Curtis..... has been a "that guy" in tons of stuff, Fear the Walking Dead, Die Hard 4, that shitty Airbender movie, Sunshine

Yeah this is a "that guy" movie. We have seen these people in a lot of stuff, but not a lot of good stuff.

WHY GOOD?

This movie is just a bigger sillier version of Tremors. I love Tremors so I enjoyed a bit of this movie.

It is a giant B movie and pretty much feels like it is ok being that.

There is a tiny bit of amazing gore. If they had amped up that angle to a silly Evil Dead II level, then it would have made this movie so much more fun.

How fun are tentacle monster that drink people and barf out skeletons? Well for m the answer is very fun!

There is an attempt to balance the humor and horror, but it needed a bit more help, but they will at least get a participation ribbon from me for trying.

The goon squad have really great machine guns in cinematic history.

Jerry Goldsmith scored this film too. I guess he likes him some ocean monster movies to make music for?

What happens when you are drank alive and barfed out!

WHY BAD?

This is just a different take on Tremors, and that movie is 100 times better than this film.

The acting is pretty terrible when it isn't Treat Williams or Wes Studi talking.

The movie doesn't know what it wants to be, horror, action, heist...all three in one but not one bit strong enough.

The tentacle monster reveal is just really dumb looking. It of course is all roaring like undersea creatures all do for some reason. It has a big dumb looking open lamprey mouth and giant googly eyes. Plus all the bitey tentacles too? What the frak is gong on with this big dumb creature?!?!

The CGI, even for 1998, is pretty terrible. Especially when it comes to the final monster reveal. Ugh! that whole bit along with the room and crazy fake background fire is just really hard to look at.

What really hurt was learning that Rob Bottin helped with the creature creation. This guy did The Thing (1982). He brought that creature to life for John Carpenter and it was amazing. Here it was not amazing. it was bad.

This critter looks so dumb...and is the size of a house.
How does it fit inside a boat?

RECCOMMEND

Parts of me really wanted to like this movie. It was stupid, had gore and was almost fun.

Almost.

Sadly the lack of film identity really hurts this movie. If they would have built up one aspect with a little of a second aspect...like horror but with a robbery, or action with some horror, etc...it would have really helped the film.

The horror and gore should have been tuned up a lot and that would have driven this to be so much more fun! When they have gore it is delightfully fun! Why not embrace that aspect?

The acting and dialogue are pretty lame, except for Wes Studi. He was and always plays a great villain.

The monster is pretty terrible and the effects for it are too.

It looks like this is another fail when it comes to undersea horror.

I cannot in good faith recommend this film to anyone as horror, action...or really very fun.

Well kiddos that ends this years run at Halloween Horror. It appears all you should watch is the Creature from the Black Lagoon. It also appears that Hollywood cannot make a good horror movie with monsters from the deep.

Aside from Jaws, but that is the gold standard of ocean horror and we all know how amazing that film is. Why can't movie makers give us something else as good and fun as that?

If anyone out there knows of a good or just really fun underwater creature feature shoot me a comment. I know there has to be something lurking beneath the waves that is gross and engrossing at the same time.