City Beneath the Sea (1971 TV Movie)
5/10
Run-of-the-mill and routine telefilm made by the king of disaster movies : Irwin Allen
17 March 2021
Set in 21 st century where a group of colonists live at an underwarter city called Pacifica under command of Admiral Matthews : Stuart Whitman , formerly it was an underwater scientist installation become a location inhabitable . The commander : Stuart Whitman is assigned by USA President : Richard Bashart to custody gold bars from Fort Knox as well as a powerful new radiaoactive stuff and some nuclear missiles. But then things go wrong when an asteroid heads towards Earth , threatening an imminent and total destruction . Theirs was the most dangerous mission in history ...to save the World from total destruction!

Irwin Allen typical movie with usual elements as fantastic submarines , World conflicts , catastrophes and spectacular intrigue . It results to be a pilot episode of a series set in 2053 and that didn't follow due to no much success of this telefilm. This time dealing with the attempt to rob the Fort Knox treasure custodied in a city beneath the sea named Pacifica and to eliminate the World threat of a meteor heading for Earth to destroy it . City beneath the sea 1971 benefits itself of a fine cast but is marred by taking stock-shots , flying subs , scale models , atrezzo and several props from the earlier shows , with stock-footage from Irwin Allen films and TV series , especially from Voyage to the bottom of the Sea and Lost in space . Here stands out a good main and support cast , some of them Irwin Allen's regular and with plenty of familiar faces , such as : Rosemary Forsyth , Burt DeBenning , Richard Basehart , Robert Wagner , James Darren , Whit Bissell, Paul Stewart , Charles Dierkop, Tom Drake ,and special guest star for Robert Wagner among others .

The motion picture was professional but regularly directed by Irwin Allen in his usual style . This great producer/writer/director made a number of successful TV series and movies and considered to be the original father of the disaster genre . As Irwin made the following ones : "Poseídon", "Beyond the Poseídon" , "Five Weeks in baloon" , "Voyage to the bottom of the sea" , "Towering Inferno" and his main flops : "The Swarm" and "When time ran out" . And outstanding with his popular TV series as "Land of Giants" , "Lost in space" , "Voyage to the bottom of the Sea" , and "The Time Tunnel" , the latter starred by James Darren , Robert Colbert and Whit Bissell who also performed thus City beneath the sea 1971 .
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