City Beneath the Sea

In the future, a city beneath the sea exists complete with a flying "mini-sub", however the commander of the city and the city itself are under threat of being killed.

Before the 1971 Irwin Allen television movie - City Beneath The Sea - came this mini-version of the film, made to get networks interested in making the production in the first place.

You really have to hand it to producer/writer/director Irwin Allen. Every spoken word in this mini-version is sharp and to the point. Your attention is 100% during every second of it and the stock Lost In Space music is so perfectly matched to what is happening on the screen. Good to see the Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea Flying Sub but why call it the "mini-sub"?

I would call this the great Irwin mini-movie that nobody got to see until decades after it was made!

It's really impossible to rate "City Beneath the Sea" as this unaired pilot is not really a full pilot...more a sales pitch to the networks about what COULD be an eventual series. In fact, unlike most pilots, it introduces the characters and shows just a few scenes from the proposed show. However, WHAT producer Irwin Allen was proposing looks exciting (and dated) when you see it today. The show was to be set about a hundred years in the future...and the government is building a city under the ocean. But the General (Glenn Corbett) is having problems...as there's an evil man (Lloyd Bochner) who is bent on destroying the project. Who knows why...but you do see a few scenes of destruction and a showdown with the General and the baddie.

The concept was very interesting for its time and it looked less like a kid's show like Allen's "Lost in Space". And, interestingly, it would have replaced NBC's "Star Trek" which had just been canceled. Overall, a wildly interesting concept that you can see if you look for this on YouTube.

I remember Irwin Allen's 1971 made for TV movie City Beneath The Sea when it first aired. I just purchased the movie....just as great as I remembered. I grew up in the early 60s and 70s with his shows and movies.