It Came from Beneath the Sea

Dir: Robert Gordon

1955

****

1955's classic monster movie It Came from Beneath the Sea was rushed and done on the cheap. It was double-billed with Creature with the Atom Brain upon release and pretty much every scene was filmed in just one take. It's puzzling really, George Worthing Yates' script was designed specifically to showcase the stop motion special effects of the now legendary Ray Harryhausen and yet the budget was reduced so much that Harryhausen had very little to work with. Legend has it that the budget was so tight that Harryhausen could only afford to animate six tentacles rather than the appropriate eight and jokingly re-named the monster the 'Sixtopus', much to the annoyance to the producers. The parts of the film that don't feature the creature are awkward and cringe-worthy. It's extremely sexist, chauvinistic and derogatory, a reflection of the times but nothing too insulting to well balanced. It's just terribly frustrating and rather boring until the monster arrives. The script has to be one of the worst of all time, it seems to be something that comes hand in hand with the classic monster movie/B-Movie, you either love it or loath it. Personally, I don't care, it's all about the work of the great Ray Harryhausen for me. I was very lucky to have met Mr. Harryhausen and I had quite an interesting conversation with him about an array of various issues within film making. Highlights included his hate for The Simpsons (he really hated The Simpsons), his favourite models (the Skeletons from Jason and the Argonauts) and what he considered the greatest achievement of his career. I thought it might be his early work on Mighty Joe Young, or indeed Jason and the Argonauts or The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms but he confessed to me that 'Trashing America in general' was what he enjoyed best, pulling down the Golden Gate Bridge at the end of It Came from Beneath the Sea in particular. A monster movie classic but only because of the great Harryhausen.