Up From the Depths | |
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Directed by | Charles B. Griffith |
Written by | Anne Dyer Alfred Sweeney |
Produced by | Jack Atienza Cirio H. Santiago |
Starring | Sam Bottoms Susanne Reed Virgil Frye Kedric Wolfe Charles Howerton |
Cinematography | Ricardo Remias |
Edited by | G. V. Bass |
Music by | James Horner & Russell O’Malley |
Distributed by | New World Pictures Shout Factory (DVD) |
Release date |
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Running time | 75 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Up From the Depths is a 1979 horror film directed by Charles B. Griffith and starring Sam Bottoms, Susanne Reed, Virgil Frye, Kedric Wolfe, and Charles Howerton. The film, along with many other natural horror films at the time of its release, was made due to the success of Jaws .
The staff and vacationers at a first-class resort on the island of Maui are beginning to mysteriously disappear. A biologist believes that an underwater earthquake has caused a giant and very hungry dormant prehistoric fish to be released from its slumber. The fish voraciously helps itself to a tourist buffet. Now it is open season for the local fishermen to find and kill the creature.
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Charles B Griffith later called making the film a "terrible experience".
We had it written by one of the typists or secretaries in the office who didn't have any thoughts of becoming a writer. I think Roger did it to punish me, to send me out to The Philippines where I didn't know what I was getting into. I was making an action picture, but The Philippines people were all so depressed, and they had made this goofy-looking fish with bug eyes. I told them that we'll make it a comedy, and their eyes lit up! So I sent back a comedy on one plane, and I arrived on the next one. By the time I arrived, Roger had already cut 75 minutes out. As an editor would say, "That's a set-up, that's a payoff!" [1]
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Up from the Depths was released on DVD by Shout Factory as a part of its "Roger Corman's Cult Classics" on January 18, 2011. Shout Factory later re-released the film on October 9, 2012. [2]
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Kurt Dahlke from DVD Talk gave the film 1.5 out of 5 stars, criticizing the film's corny acting, uneven tone, and obvious rubber monster suit. Dahlke concluded his review by writing, "Up From The Depths isn't remotely scary or thrilling, it lacks sufficient violence or gore to please the punters, and its mid-course switch to comedy isn't all that funny either. We're talking about a real heap of bronze-plated crud, so if your taste runs to Z-movies, you'll still probably have to get real drunk to eke any pleasure out of this one." [3] Charles Tatum from eFilmCritic gave the film 1/5 stars, panning the film's lack of characterizations, and suspense, as well as the film's special effects, and poor dubbing. [4] R.L. Shafer from IGN called the film "severely lacking", and "a low-rent knock-off of Steven Spielberg's smash-hit, Jaws ". [5]
Reptilicus is the mutual title of two monster films about a giant, prehistoric reptile. A pair of Danish-American co-productions produced by Cinemagic and Saga Studio, the Danish-language Reptilicus was directed by Poul Bang and released by Saga in Denmark in 1961, while the English-language Reptilicus was directed and co-written by Sidney Pink and released by American International Pictures in the United States in 1962. They've frequently been incorrectly described as two release-versions of the same film.
"In every film reference book published over the past four decades, the Danish-American monster-movie Reptilicus is listed as one film, and one film only. However, in spite of sharing an identical plot, identical sets and locations, a nearly identical cast and crew, as well as overlapping use of some shots, Reptilicus is in fact two distinct films, shot in separate languages by two directors, very much in the manner of the American/Spanish versions of Universal's 1931 Dracula."
Humongous is a 1982 Canadian slasher film directed by Paul Lynch, and starring Janet Julian, John Wildman, and David Wallace. The story centers on a group of young adults who become stranded on a deserted island, where they are stalked and murdered by a monstrous assailant.
Attack of the Crab Monsters is a 1957 independently made American black-and-white science fiction-horror film, produced and directed by Roger Corman, that stars Richard Garland, Pamela Duncan, and Russell Johnson. The film was distributed by Allied Artists as a double feature showing with Corman's Not of This Earth.
Der Todesking is a 1990 German horror film directed by Jörg Buttgereit. This experimental-style movie, which does not use central characters, explores the topic of suicide and violent death in the form of seven episodes, each one attributed to one day of the week. These episodes are enframed by the vision of a human body, slowly rotting during the course of the movie.
The Clown Murders is a 1976 Canadian horror film directed by Martyn Burke. It was one of the earliest films in which John Candy appears. The Executive Producer was Stephen Stohn, who later produced the Degrassi: The Next Generation TV series.
Charles Byron Griffith was an American screenwriter, actor, and film director. He was the son of Donna Dameral, radio star of Myrt and Marge, along with Charles' grandmother, Myrtle Vail, and was best known for writing Roger Corman productions such as A Bucket of Blood (1959), The Little Shop of Horrors (1960), and Death Race 2000 (1975).
Gunslinger is a 1956 American Western film directed by Roger Corman and starring John Ireland, Beverly Garland and Allison Hayes. The screenplay was written by Mark Hanna and Charles B. Griffith.
Elves is a 1989 American horror film directed by Jeffrey Mandel and starring Dan Haggerty, Deanna Lund, and Ken Carpenter.
Horror Rises from the Tomb, is a 1973 Spanish horror film starring Paul Naschy and directed by Carlos Aured. Leon Klimovsky was Naschy's first choice for director, but he was busy on another film so his assistant director Carlos Aured took the job. Naschy was mercilessly rushed into writing the screenplay for the producers in 36 hours, yet after the film was completed, it took more than a year to get it released in theaters. The film was shot in February 1972, and was only released in Spain and Mexico on April 27, 1973 as El espanto surge de la tumba. The film was released in Germany on October 4, 1974 as Blutmesse fur der Teufel/ Blood Mass for the Devil. They re-released the film in Germany on Sept. 2, 1980 as Blood Mass of the Zombies in an attempt to cash in on George Romero's hit film Dawn of the Dead. In France, the film was retitled L'amour parmi les monstres.
Blood Tide is a 1982 British horror film directed by Richard Jefferies, and starring James Earl Jones, José Ferrer, Lila Kedrova, Lydia Cornell, Mary Louise Weller, Martin Kove, and Deborah Shelton. Its plot follows a young American couple visiting a Greek island where the husband's sister disappeared; they soon find that an ancient monster has been released, forcing the villagers to return to the practice of human sacrifice to appease it.
Dr. Heckyl and Mr. Hype is a 1980 American comedy-drama horror romance film directed by Charles B. Griffith, starring Oliver Reed and Sunny Johnson.
The Nesting is a 1981 American supernatural horror film directed and co-written by Armand Weston, and starring Robin Groves, Michael Lally, John Carradine and Gloria Grahame in her final film role. Its plot follows an agoraphobic novelist who rents a rural mansion that she comes to find is haunted by the prostitute victims of a mass murder that occurred there in the 1940s.
Eat My Dust! is a 1976 American action comedy film written and directed by Charles B. Griffith, and starring Ron Howard.
Smokey Bites the Dust is a 1981 car chase film from New World Pictures directed by Charles B. Griffith. Despite the title, the film is not connected to the Smokey and the Bandit series.
Devil Hunter is a 1980 horror film directed by Jesús Franco under the pseudonym "Clifford Brown" and written by Franco and Julián Esteban. It was shot back-to-back with Franco's Mondo Cannibale. It is one of the infamous "video nasties" that were banned in the United Kingdom in the 1980s.
Shadow of the Hawk is a 1976 horror film directed by George McCowan and written by Norman Thaddeus Vane and Herbert Wright. The film stars Jan-Michael Vincent, Marilyn Hassett, Chief Dan George, Pia Shandel, Marianne Jones and Jacques Hubert.
Excessive Force II: Force on Force is a 1995 American direct-to-video action film starring Stacie Randall and Dan Gauthier. It was written by Mark Sevi and directed by Jonathan Winfrey. The film is a sequel to Excessive Force (1993), despite not bearing any relation to the original movie or its storyline.
The Loreley's Grasp is a 1973 Spanish horror film written and directed by Amando de Ossorio, and starring Tony Kendall, and Helga Liné. The film centers on a series of horrific murders in a German town by the Rhine river perpetrated by a deadly water spirit known as the Lorelei.
Gums is a 1976 American softcore pornographic film. It was a send up of Jaws and received a relatively wide theatrical release as a midnight movie.