Deep Rising

Deep Rising
Promotional film poster
Directed by	Stephen Sommers
Produced by	John Baldecchi Mario Iscovich Laurence Mark
Written by	Stephen Sommers Uncredited: Robert Mark Kamen
Starring	Treat Williams Famke Janssen Kevin J. O'Connor Anthony Heald Derrick O'Connor Cliff Curtis Djimon Hounsou Wes Studi
Music by	Jerry Goldsmith
Cinematography	Howard Atherton
Editing by	Bob Ducsay John Wright
Distributed by	Hollywood Pictures (USA) Cinergi Pictures (international)
Release date(s)	January 30, 1998
Running time	106 min.
Language	English
Budget	USD$45,000,000
Box office	Domestic 11,203,026

Deep Rising is a 1998 action horror film directed by Stephen Sommers. It was distributed by Hollywood Pictures and Cinergi Pictures, and was released in the United States on January 30, 1998.

Plot

The film opens with text explaining about trenches deep underwater with undiscovered sea life, then cuts to a boat being piloted through a storm on the South China Sea by John Finnegan (Treat Williams). He has been chartered to transport a group of men (later discovered by Finnegan's crewman Joey "Tooch" Pantucci (Kevin J. O'Connor) to be mercenaries) to a specific destination. Finnegan's third crew member is Pantucci's girlfriend Leila (Una Damon).

The focus shifts to the Argonautica, a luxurious cruise ship, embarking on its maiden voyage with many wealthy passengers. The ship is the dream and brainchild of Simon Canton (Anthony Heald) and is under the watchful eye of the seasoned Captain Atherton (Derrick O'Connor). Mingling among the guests and taking full opportunity of the facilities and entertainment is Trillian, (Famke Janssen) a wanted thief who notes unusual noises on the ocean. The party reaches full swing as Canton delivers a speech, christening the ship and those sailing in her to good times.

With the crew and passengers occupied, Trillian steals the Captain's ID card and breaks in the ship's safe. However while pilfering the valuables she is apprehended by Canton and Captain Atherton. Trillian is placed in a storeroom as the brig is incomplete. Meanwhile, the party carries on while a saboteur disables the ship's navigation and communication systems. This leads to the ship running blind, leading Canton into hysterics. The crewman manning the sonar notices a large, swift object approaching which then collides with the ship. The ensuing crash causes the passengers to panic as one passenger runs into a bathroom, only to be pulled through the toilet.

The mercenaries install a torpedo launcher on Finnegan's boat when it suddenly crashes into a drifting speed boat, resulting in damage to the engines. The mercenaries ((leader) Hanover (Wes Studi), Vivo (Djimon Hounsou), Mason (Clifton Powell), Mulligan (Jason Flemyng), Billy (Clint Curtis), T-Ray (Trevor Goddard), and Mamooli (Cliff Curtis)) then take Finnegan and his crew hostage. Once they reach the Argonautica they split up into several groups, leaving Billy to watch Leila. The mercenaries use schematics given to them by an insider, but they quickly realize something is amiss upon the discovery of blood “everywhere”.

The first party heads to the safe room and finds Trillian there. She had escaped the store room by short circuiting the electronic door lock. She intended to have another go at stealing the contents of the safe, this time using Canton's access card. The party unlocks the safe but Vivo is killed the moment the safe door opens by a frightened Canton, who drives an axe into his head. Two of the other mercenaries immediately open fire into the vault killing three of the people inside.

Meanwhile, in the engine room Finnegan and Pantucci witness Mamooli and T-Ray being dragged underwater and disappearing by an unseen force. Back on Finnegan's boat, Leila suffers a similar fate. The two separated parties meet up in an elevator which crashes shortly thereafter revealing a hallway lined with human skeletons stripped clean of their flesh. They are then attacked by spiked tentacles and flee to a supposed safe location. Canton reveals that the cost of the boat and maintaining it have bankrupted him, so he hired the mercenaries to destroy the ship so he can get the insurance money. They are quickly attacked again where one of the party's attacks on a tentacle reveals Billy, half digested and in severe shock.

As the party's numbers dwindle, Canton theorizes that the tentacles are evolved members of the Ottoia family of deep-sea worms which strip their prey of all body liquids then eject the carcass. Finnegan points out that the tentacles are driving the party to a specific location, and when the party is split up. Two more mercenaries and Captain Atherton himself are killed: Mason was dragged underwater while swimming and activated a grenade to blow the tentacle with it. While Mulligan fought off a tentacle in the kitchen, only to be consumed by another tentacle. Soon, only Finnegan, Trillian, Pantucci, Hanover, and Canton are left. Following another encounter with the tentacles, the five are split up. Finnegan loses the parts he had gathered earlier to repair his boat's engine, rendering it unable to go any further than "a city block." Meanwhile, Hanover and Pantucci attempt to slow the tentacles down with grenades; when this fails, Hanover shoots Joey in the leg and attempts to save himself. Ironically Joey survives while Hanover is next seen being engulfed by a creature. When Joey hands him a pistol, Hanover wastes its remaining bullet firing at Joey and is unable to commit suicide before the tentacle swallows him whole.

Finnegan returns to his boat after the party discovers a nearby island and has Pantucci plot a course in the autopilot to crash it into the Argonautica. Meanwhile he positions a torpedo in the hole of his boat so that it will detonate upon impact, hopeful that this will destroy the infestation. He then returns to the ship just in time to rescue Trillian from Canton, who is about to dispatch her with a flare gun. Trillian and Finnegan then attempt to return to the boat but find the octopus-like body of the creature possessing the tentacles emerging into the liner's main atrium. It grabs Finnegan, who escapes by shooting the creature in the eye. Canton escapes alone to Finnegan's boat, breaking his legs in the process, only to discover the boat is on auto pilot. Unable to disengage the autopilot the boat crashes into the Argonautica and the torpedoes explode. The explosion destroys the creature and kills Canton as Finnegan and Trillian use a jet ski to escape the ship just as it is destroyed. They reach the island, where they encounter Pantucci, who has drifted there. As the party relaxes, a loud roar echoes across the island and something crashes through the nearby forest, which is actually much smaller than it originally appeared,the largest part of the island is shown as being a system of volcanoes. The film ends with an exasperated Finnegan saying "Now what?".

Cast

• Treat Williams as John Finnegan
• Famke Janssen as Trillian Saint James
• Anthony Heald as Simon Canton
• Kevin J. O'Connor as Joey "Tooch" Pantucci
• Wes Studi as Hanover
• Derrick O'Connor as Captain Atherton
• Jason Flemyng as Mulligan
• Cliff Curtis as Mamooli
• Clifton Powell as Mason
• Trevor Goddard as T-Ray Jones
• Djimon Hounsou as Vivo
• Clint Curtis as Billy
• Una Damon as Leila

Reception

The film received mostly negative reviews. A Rotten Tomatoes "Rotten" rating of 30% based on 27 reviews, 0% of top critics based on five reviews and 44% of the user score based on 165 reviews. It also made Roger Ebert's most hated films list. In his own words, "[Deep Rising] is essentially an Alien clone with a fresh paint job."^[1]

On its opening weekend it made $4,737,793 (42% of its total gross), ranking #8.

Deep Rising ended up being a box office bomb, with total intake of a little over $11,000,000 on a $45,000,000 budget.^[2]

References

1. ^ http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/19980130/REVIEWS/801300303/1023
2. ^ http://boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=deeprising.htm

External links

• Deep Rising at the Internet Movie Database
• Deep Rising at AllRovi
• Original draft
• Review
• Japanese poster
• Stomp Tokyo review
• Footage re-used in another film