When a band of ruthless hijackers invade the world's most luxurious cruise ship, they're shocked to discover the passengers have mysteriously vanished! But that doesn't mean they are alone! Something terrifying is lurking just out of sight: a deadly force from the unexplored depths of the ocean that begins to snatch the horrified intruders one by one! A group of heavily armed hijackers board a luxury ocean liner in the South Pacific Ocean to loot it, only to do battle with a series of large-sized, tentacled, man-eating sea creatures who have taken over the ship first. I *adore* terrible movies, even without Crowe, Servo, and Joel dishing out the quips. There's a list of movies I simply adore at least in part BECAUSE they're so terrible – "Reptilicus" is one such, a film so bad that apparently merely to MENTION it in Denmark requires the one who Speaks Its Name to buy a case of beer for everyone in earshot.<br/><br/>However, the ne plus ultra, the sine qua non, the crème de la crème, the (insert pretentious foreign phrase of choice here) of terrible movies for me is "Deep Rising." While it could have used, in my humble opinion, more scenes of Famke Janssen changing clothes ("She's naked during the entire picture!" "She is NUDE in once scene!" "Depends how you watch it" –"Coupling"), the premise is choice: world's largest luxury liner is scheduled for paramilitary attack, but the attackers soon discover the liner has been taken over by Giant Vampire Squid From The Bottom Of The Sea. <br/><br/>Treat Williams, as the Harry Morgan (the one from Hemingsay, not the one from M*A*S*H) wannabe whose boat is first hired, then hijacked (hirejacked?) by said paramilitarians, skirts on the edge of tongue in cheek, but his supporting cast play it almost completely deadpan. Anthony Heald, an actor I've seen in person more than once (he was stunning in "Equivocation," at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival), is simply far too good to be in a picture this crappy, but as he told a friend of mine in Ashland once, he has children to put through college. <br/><br/>Kevin O'Conner (the annoying guy who gets eaten by scarabs at the end of the first "Mummy" pic) plays the annoying sidekick but one with heart, and he's brilliant. The head villain, played by Wes Studi (The Sphinx in "Mystery Men"), is as hard-bitten and stone-faced as they come, and his gang of hired mercenaries are evil enough to deserve their come-uppance at the hands, er, tentacles of the aforementioned vampire squid, one by one.<br/><br/>It's a film I've probably seen half a dozen times, on late-night cable, and would watch again right now, preferably with a platter of calamari and a bottle of Beaujolais – violating the white-wine- with-seafood rule because Beaujolais goes with everything, and you need a lot of red with your tentacles just to achieve parity with this picture. Nicely done sci-fi/horror of a gang of modern day pirates with ingenious Chinese weapons looking for a big money payoff as sea. These "commado " types hire a straight flying "wanderluster", his speedy boat and his oddball crew on a very stormy night on a mission known only to the seedy group of well armed neo-pirates. Their mission, and they've chosen to take it, is armed attack and take over of a sparking new 450 million cruise ship on it's maiden voyage in the China Sea. Now why a maiden voyage in the China Sea is a mystery, unless you would have read the script of this amusing action thriller. You see it has to take place over one of the deepest parts of the Pacific Ocean, the China Sea Trench. One reason for this….the ship has to sink "after" all the passengers have been taken off in the life rafts. No one will be able to visit the wreck due it's depth in the trench. The bad guys even have torpedo bombs to make sure the ship "Titanics". Why?……. you ask yourself do these guys want to sink a brand new ship? More important is once the speedboat arrives at the ocean liner (still rough seas and constant lightning, thunder and deluge of rain) is it sitting dead in the water. Well all the bad guys force the Captain of the speedboat and "comic relief man", the engine mechanic, to board the cruise ship together. This is where it does get kinda creepy. The interior of the ship, the lounges, restaurants and casinos are wrecked. Everything has been thrown all over the place. But creepier still much of the debris. broken chairs, tipped roulette wheels, smashed tables and those endless buffets are cover in blood and slime. Everyone seems to have checked out without using the life boats. The passengers are gone. Very strange! With homage to the original Posieden adventure, Aliens, and "Arnold I'll be back Swarzecnager" this flick is enjoyable, but generally forgettable. CG is great in some scenes and below par in others. The added element of humor works some of the time, but suffers in others. You could do worse on a Friday night a 9:45 at Hollywood Video. CLIVE 13 RATING SYSTEM IS AS FOLLOWS…. VSLWACSEF V…..for Violence (extreme) S…..for Sex (Very little hetro, some macho beefcake) L…..L is Language (pretty tame, just a few F words) W….W is for Writing/story (nothing totally new , mild twist) A…..A is for Acting (Basically B actors, but acceptable) C…..C is for Continuity (better than many similar films) SE…SE is for Special Effects (creature was decent, others grade c+) F…..F is for Frightening (not really…although I don't like being in water up to my waist when there is an underwater monster about!) Favorite line….Much overused by Mr straight guy captain of the speedboat "What now?" Best Scene……Creature shows it size , strength and eyes, which the captain promptly impales with a flare gun making the squid like Alienesque creature very upset. Worst Scene….Why is it that a regular torpedo can explode at the waterline of a huge cruise ship and then have it ALL blow up just the way Tokyo always did in the Godzilla franchise? And….you can tell it's a miniature model….Poor CG.<br/><br/>RECOMMENDED for bit of cheeky fun with little redeeming value 6-7 out of 10
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