Kraken: Tentacles of the Deep

What if I told you this low-budget sea monster movie was so "off," I would have sworn it was shot in South Africa, which has given us many very bad sea creature flicks. It apparently was shot in Canada, which I still find hard to believe -- not that most Canadian-lensed flicks aren't just as abysmal. Two groups of people are after a treasured artifact, which is guarded by a giant squid. The two groups come to blows, but in the end the squid takes care of a lot of them. The only "name" actor is TV thespian Jack Scalia, who has seen better days. So has the director, who gave us the surreal and sublime THE GATE back in the day. I just can't get over how odd this movie feels. In a very small way, the plot resembles that of THE DEEP. However, it is not worth watching, unless you're having trouble sleeping.

but I watched the whole thing. Unfortunately full of errors regarding diving as my daughter kept commenting on throughout the movie.

Charlie O'Connell is definitely not the actor his brother is (not that his brother is a great actor). The Kraken was not much of a scare. I hated the underwater shots where it was hard to tell the difference between the good and bad guys. The best part of the movie was the jokes we made about it. Watch it if nothing else is on but don't have any expectations about quality. The tentacles of the Kraken are supposedly razor sharp but they only cut some of the time. The ending sucked the big enchilada. You gotta give the folks at SciFi some credit, they keep churning out these films so we can relive the whole B-movie thing of the 50's.

So here in Oregon we have our share of crappy weather Saturdays. I personally choose to enjoy a day of lame Sci-Fi (or SyFy, whatever) channel movies. Yes they're all B-movies, but some are just so bad they're GREAT!

The Kraken: Tentacles of the Deep, however, is NOT one of those.

This film puts the UN in unwatchable. The plot is so thin you couldn't cut it with a razor. The acting is atrocious! Especially Charlie O'Conner! My god is he bad! His acting in this film actually makes Victoria Pratt and Jack Scalia look like Oscar nominees! While we're on the subject, Mr. Scalia is supposed to be Greek. But his accent changes constantly from European, to Austrailian, to non-existent! The directing? I don't know if the director even showed up!

My suggestion? Skip this one. It's boring, contrived, nonsense. Too much silly, predictable treasure hunting, not enough giant squid.

HEADS UP: While watching KRAKEN: TENTACLES OF THE DEEP, you might notice the pungent aroma of months-old, sunbaked chum.

It's the tedious tale of a man seeking revenge for his parents, who were killed by the titular terror. There are also some treasure hunters, along with the ne'er-do-wells who seek to abscond with the treasure.

How could this be bad?

Enter the multi-armed mess itself, a cartoonish CGI abomination that's so utterly preposterous that it takes you immediately out of the movie and leaves you there. Even the fish in MR. LIMPET was more realistic. And more frightening!

TIP: To recreate the feeling of watching this "movie" without having to actually sit through it, simply sit with wet spaghetti on your head until you can't take it any more...

I've never read JAWS by Peter Benchley but have of course seen the movie andJAWS is considered to be one of the few films that improves greatly onthe book . Much of this I'm told is to do with a large number of subplots being jettisoned in the adaptation , leaving only the main plot of a man eating shark and of the protagonists mission to kill it . One can't help thinking the producers of this movie should have done something similar

The major problem is that much of the running time is taken up with a bunch of bad guys wanting to get their hands on a very expensive Greek opal . In many ways the story resembles another Benchley story THE DEEP which might not be a problem as such but when you've got a film called KRAKEN:TENTACLES OF THE DEEP then a prospective audience is expecting a giant squid to be the focus of the story rather than humans . The producers seem aware of this shoehorning a squid attack just to remind the audience there's a squid central to the plot when in fact it's the producers themselves who obviously need reminding

As it's produced by Nu Image Films the production values are rather poor with the squid being a rather obvious CGI creation . Like nearly every film featuring a giant squid it makes a roaring sound ( Squids are mute ) and can grab people off the decks of ships ( Considered impossible by leading scientists ) and of course when someone gets devoured underwater there's a big bubble of blood rising to the surface . Not only that but biologists are all in their early twenties , have blonde hair and walk around in bikini tops thereby exposing their admirable mammary glands . One can't help thinking Nu Image Films and The Sci-Fi channel are in cahoots to get more guys to sign up to university science classes . I doubt however if anyone who worked on this film would be able to spell the word science