Starring Sam Bottoms, Susanne Reed and Virgil (THE CAT CREATURE) Frye. Written by Alfred M. Sweeney and Anne (BATTLE BEYOND THE STARS) Dyer, directed by Charles B. (WIZARDS OF THE LOST KINGDOM II) Griffith and produced by Cirio H. (VAMPIRE HOOKERS) Santiago, Rolando S. Atienza, Roger (DAY THE WORLD ENDED) Corman, Jill (DR. HECKYL AND MR. HYPE) Griffith and Manny Norman. A New World Pictures production.

An underwater earthquake releases a big prehistoric fish. Yay!

This fiendish fish flick stars Sam (THE LAST PICTURE SHOW) Bottoms, who also starred in APOCALYPSE NOW, another movie shot in the Philippines. But that’s where similarities end, as UP FROM THE DEPTHS will never be mistaken for a classic film, whereas Francis Ford Coppola’s awesome Vietnam War-set epic is a bonafide classic movie.

Even though Chris (THE FLY) Walas helped make the monster, there’s nothing particularly special about this fish-critter’s design, other than it has a double dorsal fin and resembles a grouper fish. The poster, however, tries to make out the beast is a kind of blue, spiky-skinned, red-eyed shark-monster. I’ve seen behind the scenes shots of the full-size fish-head prop being propelled through the water by divers, but supposedly it proved too heavy to move around much. So, basically, the beast is only fleetingly shown during its assaults on swimmers.

Maybe I’m easily pleased, but I thought the full scale monster fish head at least looked like a decently-made model, even if it did remind me of a grouper fish. The director, Charles B. Griffith (writer of such films as ATTACK OF THE CRAB MONSTERS, BEAST FROM HAUNTED CAVE, A BUCKET OF BLOOD and THE LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS), definitely wasn’t a fan of the monster model, however, and felt compelled to make the movie pretty much into a comedy. But when producer Roger Corman saw Griffith’s cut he wasn’t very happy, as he thought that audiences would feel cheated if they went to see a JAWS rip-off movie and discovered that it was a comedy instead, so Corman had it re-edited in post-production, turning it into a straight horror picture.

As it is, the silly dialogue merged with the more ‘serious’ story edit helps to sink this fishy tale, as does the murky underwater photography and the blurry, indistinct fish attacks (that use a smaller monster model). Oh well.

Let’s at least end this post with a clearer shot of the fish…