TERROR BENEATH THE SEA (1966) Movie Review

Scare-A-Thon Totals to Date:

Total Movies Watched: 22
Total First Time Views: 10
Amount raised for AMAZON WATCH: $1,820.72

Terror Beneath the Sea (1966) d. Hajime Sato (Japan) (78 min) (1st viewing)

During a press conference/demonstration of a new guided underwater missile, a unidentified humanoid shape is viewed on the Navy’s closed-circuit television monitors. Their curiosity sparked, reporters Ken Abe (Shinichi “Sonny” Chiba) and Jenny Gleason (Peggy Neal) decide to explore the area with scuba gear the following day, where Jenny has a close encounter with a low-rent Gill-Man, even getting close enough to snap a photo, losing her camera in the struggle. When the Navy refuses to believe her story, she and Ken head back out, only to be kidnapped by a swarm of the creatures and taken to the underwater laboratory of the nefarious Dr. Moore (Erik Neilson), who has dreams and schemes of transforming humanity into an army of amphibian cyborgs under his control! It’s up to Ken and Jen to clock the doc before the trouble bubbles and our lives take a dive.

WOLF GUY (1975) Blu-ray review

Wolf Guy (1975) d. Yamaguchi, Kazuhiko (Japan) (1st viewing) 86 min

In this bizarre mixture of horror, action, sexploitation, and sci-fi, international superstar Sonny Chiba (Japan’s answer to Bruce Lee) is a cop who is also the only surviving member of a clan of ancient werewolves who relies on his supernatural powers to solve crimes! (After watching Teen Wolf and Teen Wolf Too, I’m starting to think that werewolves were the original superheroes – they’re able to box, play basketball, sleuth, pretty much anything!)

SUSHI GIRL (2012) review

Sushi Girl (2012) (1st viewing) d. Saxton, Kern (USA)

Six years after a diamond heist goes sour, crime boss Tony Todd marks the prison release of Noah Hathaway (the lone arrest made) with a special old team reunion to answer a few questions about what went wrong, a gathering whose centerpiece involves seafood delicacies served off lovely Cortney Palm’s prone naked body. Director Saxton has assembled a notably unconventional and skilled cast that includes not only Todd (who exec-produced) and Neverending Story alumnus Hathaway, but James Duval, Andy Mackenzie, Michael Biehn, Jeff Fahey, Danny Trejo, Sonny Chiba, and casting coup non pareil, Mark Hamill as a fey psycho whose stringy locks bring to mind ’70s era Paul Williams on a really bad day. Watching this venerable team of underrated talents square off should be entertainment enough for most, but the ultimate equation is less than the sum of its parts. Clearly Saxton and co-writer Destin Pfaff have a deep love for Reservoir Dogs, but stunt casting + ornate production design + nasty torture sequences does not a Tarantino breakout make…especially if the memorably chewy Tarantino dialogue fails to show up (Todd’s ominous “oven timer” monologue notwithstanding). The result is a well-produced film with lofty ambitions, full of sound and fury...that ultimately feels like much ado about nothing.