It Came from Beneath the Sea

Although modelled after Eugène Lourié’s “The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms” (1953) – Ray Harryhausen even provided both films’ stop-motion effects – this film turned out decidedly inferior to its forerunner. Robert Gordon’s direction is unbelievably lackadaisical, the protagonists exceedingly obnoxious. Particularly off-putting is the pomposity that Faith Domergue lends the character of Lesley Joyce, a maladroit symbol of feminism who seems to believe that emulating stereotypical male behavior is the way to get ahead.

There’s an aura of speciesism wafting over the entire movie as the human race arrogantly asserts its role as the world’s judge, jury, and executioner – notably: “Man’s knowledge has so increased that any upheaval of nature would no be beyond his belief”. And when it comes to making those decisions that affect the entire world, the United States is definitely king of the hill (the decision to go forward with blocking the Pacific clearly illustrates the point).

Coming full circle, we see the typical post-World War II glorification of military might (even an eminent marine biologist joins in, chillingly eager to destroy a new marine species), but this film goes the extra mile, poking fun at the anxieties born of the atomic era(“H-bombs have been blamed for every freak accident that’s happened since, up to and including marine monsters being disturbed“).

The (pseudo)scientific explanation of why the sea monster turned to anthropophagy deserves special mention. Dr. Joyce’s conclusion: “This is where our monster must have lived until recently, when he became radioactive and began to warn his natural prey out of the surrounding waters. He had to find other food or die“. Stark raving lunacy!

Suffering heavily from its tight budget, the film struggles simply to be entertaining (rumor has it that budgetary constraints led poor Harryhausen to cut the number of tentacles on the super-octopus). Among the few scenes worthy of note, we would mention the octopus trashing San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge.