Pretty Good

Good concept, poorly executed.

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

You know your movie is in trouble when even the creature-on-girl stuff is sloppy.Roger Corman always prided himself (at least up until a certain point in his career, and this is still his New World Pictures era when there was.... well, it was before Carnosaur and Sharktopus, let's put it that way) on having cheesy B-movie fun with things but also having some level of quality or interest in *something* else that could be there for the audience. That isn't there in Humanoids from the Deep.This is where he tries, whether this was his call or incidental from the writers I don't know, to put in some liberal-type element into the story with the Native American Indian who's land is being screwed with and... who cares? A lot of this movie feels like wasted potential in that it has a who-gives-a-s*** plot, but then the creature effects (or, I should say, the three creature suits, one of them only being completed by Rob Bottin) are pretty good and when the climax happens there's some creative editing to make it seem like there are more when, of course, there aren't, with some decent gore (although it's almost ruined by the repeated 5-second loop of screaming sound effects which I wouldn't notice except it's repeated 100 times in ten minutes). Also, James Horner's score is fine and does its job as a serious thriller score.But there's a reason this feels lazy on multiple fronts; the movie is a Frankenstein monster of editing, where, as Corman admits without compunction on the Shout Factory DVD interview, that he and the editors took the movie away from Barbara Peters because, as Corman put it, there wasn't enough rape that she shot (the kinder version is that she didn't shoot enough sex and violence, which also had a different title, whether she knew this would be changed from "Beneath the Darkness" to this one who knows). So on the one hand there's a passable-to-just-okay-and... no, there's not much logic to it on one hand (plus the performances are by actors who are barely B level, more like C), and on the other a sleazy bag of exploitation movie tricks that Corman and his assistant directors and editors pull to make it more tantalizing. Not to mention, of course, the fact that these mutated salmon-mansters do in fact inseminate the women which has, naturally, a payoff at the very, very end which, surprisingly, feels tacked on when all is said and done.I could go into why a lot of the human story stuff doesn't work or lacks logic - chiefly why, after that opening where several people DIE IN A FIRE on a boat and no one investigates this (or the multiple dead dogs, which gets a shrug from the would-be excuses for Stephen King characters, as in they'd be in King stories if he lacked talent) - but I don't see the point. You may take to this schlock, but I didn't find enough to keep me really engaged past a certain point, despite the last twenty minutes trying to throw as much as it can at you. It certainly does try as far as lots of blood and gore and breasts (and some of those breasts, I'll readily admit, look splendid). But even at 79 minutes this is pushing it.

Please, don't get me wrong. I knew when I watched a film made in 1980 called 'Humanoids From the Deep' that I wasn't expecting a major work of art with dynamic character arcs, unique plot points or even reasonable special effects. I was simply hoping for a 'so-bad-it's-good' film. I got half of what I was looking for. It is bad. It's just not that good.I know it's a 'cult classic' therefore there are a lot of people out there who have found it both good and bad in equal doses, but I just wasn't one of them. When asked to sum up the plot, I simply say: refer to the title. It basically tells you everything you need to know. Monsters from underwater kill people. Oh, maybe I should say that they mainly kill MEN. Women, who seem to spend much of their time running around in bikinis, get other treatment – treatment that makes death look dignified in comparison.I've seen many cheap horror films, all of which used their lack of budget as a bonus. A horror film doesn't have to be expensive to be scary/good. This one didn't have much money for the monsters. And it showed. They're not really in it for much of the first half and, when they do turn up, they're not really worth the wait.The acting, despite having cult actor Doug McClure hamming it up, still isn't memorable enough to be that interesting. It was just all an exercise in tragic mediocrity. There are a thousand better monster films out there – a thousand that have better special effects, a thousand that have better acting and a thousand that are scarier. And, all of these are still cheesy so-bad-they're-good B-movies. It's not even worth comparing the likes of Humanoids From the Deep to Hollywood's 'big budget' horror films that are actually designed to be good, rather than bad-good.If you really like cheesy eighties monster movies then you might like this. I normally do, I just couldn't get my mind to sink low enough on this occasion to appreciate it. However, I am still tempted to watch the nineties remake! I guess I get what I deserve!

"Humanoids from the Deep" is considered by many B movie fans to be a gory and sleazy cult classic of sorts. My feelings towards it are not quite as strong. Certainly, the movie does have its strengths. Though made with one of producer Roger Corman's legendary low budgets, the movie has an acceptable look, from the photography to the creature and gore effects. Speaking of gore, the attack sequences are pretty well handled, sometimes throwing in some nice gratuitous nudity as well. The climax and concluding sequence are pretty wild and satisfying.However, the movie is not without its faults. For one thing, there is a real old fashioned feeling to much of the story - it's more or less a recreation of those low budget monster suit movies made in the 1950s, though with more explicit violence and sexual material thrown in to try and hide that fact. And the story has its share of slow spots where nothing really important is happening. The biggest problem is that none of the characters in the movie becomes really prominent - the movie really needed one or two dominant character to carry things. As there is, there's not enough time given to any character to make us care about anyone.Is the movie worth seeing? Overall, I would say yes, on the condition that you don't have high expectations. The movie is good, but not THAT good.

Roger Corman produces yet another classic piece of trash, having it helmed by Barbara Peeters (unsurprisingly her last movie ever directed). This time the black lagoon throwback delivers a story of sex-crazed mutant amphibians hell-bent on raping all the broads, whilst dispatching of any potential competition. Flailing long arms with razor-sharp talons disembowel and cause unwaning blood splattering, while girls show off their youthful graces while screaming in horror. To stop the onslaught a mild mannered elderly fisherman (or Fisherman to punctuate his hero status?) Jim Hill (Doug McClure) leads the stand-off with Indian Johnny Eagle (Anthony Pena) his brave Tonto. All in order to counterattack the science-initiated epidemic of killer trout-men with big bulging brains.Unabashedly exploitational "Humanoids from the Deep" with a strong sexual innuendo (and several rape sequences) coupled with absolute adoration to gorrific entertainment, Corman produces another guilty pleasure - a movie so morally inept, script-horrific, but entirely enticing and engaging. Epitomising dumb fun, it is inexplicably entertaining offering a hearty laugh at the in-built stupidity, while also keeping the blood pumping through some well-defined tension. Albeit idiotic in base premise and execution the whole movie is done tongue and cheek, winking at the audience. A stand-out scene occurs during an absolutely hilarious attack on a ventriloquist and his girl, where the puppet rolls his eyes to get a glimpse at all the bloody action.