Deep Rising (1998)

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 had already invaded the ship.

Director:

Stephen Sommers

Writer:

Stephen Sommers

Stars:

Treat Williams, Famke Janssen, Anthony Heald

1 nomination.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Treat Williams	...	John Finnegan
Famke Janssen	...	Trillian St. James
Anthony Heald	...	Simon Canton
Kevin J. O'Connor	...	Joey Pantucci
Wes Studi	...	Hanover
Derrick O'Connor	...	Captain Atherton
Jason Flemyng	...	Mulligan
Cliff Curtis	...	Mamooli
Clifton Powell	...	Mason
Trevor Goddard	...	T. Ray
Djimon Hounsou	...	Vivo
Una Damon	...	Leila
Clint Curtis	...	Billy
Warren Takeuchi	...	Radar Man (as Warren T. Takeuchi)
Linden Banks	...	Communications Officer

Storyline

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!

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Plot Keywords:

ship | creature feature | ocean | hijacker | tentacle | 

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Taglines:

This ain't no pleasure cruise

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Genres:

Action | Adventure | Horror | Sci-Fi

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated R for sci-fi violence and gore

Details

Country:

USA Canada

Language:

English Korean

Release Date:

30 January 1998 (USA)

Also Known As:

Tentacle

Filming Locations:

Malibu, California, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$45,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend USA:

$4,737,793, 1 February 1998, Wide Release

Gross USA:

$11,203,026

Company Credits

Production Co:

Calimari Productions, Cinergi Pictures Entertainment, Hollywood Pictures

Technical Specs

Runtime:

106 min

Sound Mix:

DTS Dolby Digital SDDS

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.39 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

After shooting the scene at the beginning of the film with all of the extras, the first assistant director thanked the extras then introduced director Stephen Sommers to them. The extras were confused, since they assumed the first AD WAS the director. In the bluray commentary, Sommers explains that if he were to give direction to any of the extras they would get paid as actors according to SAG (Screen Actors Guild) rules.

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Goofs

When the creatures first strike the boat, and the passengers are running scared, the young Asian woman locks herself in the bathroom. When the creature is sneaking up on her through the toilet that she is sitting on, she frantically grabs the sink faucet. When she first grabs hold of it, you can already see it moving before she pulls it off its hinges.

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Quotes

Finnegan: [Hanover's goons are beating up Pantucci] We got a contract: 20 hours out and back. You beat my engine man to death, it's gonna take a hell of a lot longer - which is ok by me since overtime'll cost you double rate!
Hanover: He was nosing around in my cargo!
Finnegan: Ok, so he's nosy.
Hanover: Contract was "no questions asked."
Mason: Yo, fellas, I vote we kick this lil' piece of shit overboard!
Mamooli: Well, I vote we kill him!
Mulligan: I vote we kill him, then throw him overboard!
Finnegan: Well, we don't vote here, it's NOT a democracy.
[...]

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Connections

Featured in Wet Cold Canadian Summer with Wes Studi (2018)

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Soundtracks

Shudan
Written by Gary Kiyoshi Nagata (as Gary Nagata)
Performed by Yakudo

User Reviews

It's officially the best film ever made.

Deep Rising is one of the best films ever made, if not the best! That's right, I'm making a bold statement but it's true. Clearly many of you here will disagree, but when you've seen the evidence that I put forward I don't think you'll be able to argue:

1) The Godfather: The Godfather was less believable than Deep Rising and also lacked such things as multi barrelled assault rifles, jet skis and huge torpedoes. Deep rising however, did not.

2) Raging Bull: No half-digested/half alive bodies, no engine room full of bloody bones or cool looking harpoon guns. Deep Rising had all these things.

3) Citizen Kane: A worthy try, but in the end Orson Welles decision to omit massive underwater squid monsters, left this film floundering. Deep Rising came up trumps in this department.

4) Casablanca: Fails to deliver on every account. Most notably, no one gets pulled down a toilet. Again, Deep Rising excels.

The sad thing is that if the Colour Purple had included a raid on a sinking cruise liner, infested with sub aqua monsters as part of the film, then it too would have climbed to the top of my favourite movie list. But as with most films the director took the easy way out and chose to ignore this very overlooked area of filmmaking.

In my aquatic monster/cruise liner catastrophe marking system, Deep Rising gets a colossal 4 shrimps. But the rather lacking Godfather, gets only 3 angelfish and a haddock.