Deep Rising

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Deep Rising

Promotional film poster
Directed by Stephen Sommers
Produced by John Baldecchi
Mario Iscovich
Laurence Mark
Written by Stephen Sommers
Robert Mark Kamen (uncredited)
Music by Jerry Goldsmith
Cinematography Howard Atherton
Editing by Bob Ducsay
John Wright
Distributed by Hollywood Pictures
Cinergi Pictures
Release date(s) January 30, 1998
Running time 106 min.
Language English
Budget USD$45,000,000
Allmovie profile
IMDb profile

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.

Contents

[edit] Plot

The film opens on a boat being piloted through a storm on the South China Sea by John Finnegan (Treat Williams). Under the motto of 'If the cash is there, we do not care' he has been chartered to transport a group of suspicious men and a cargo to a specific destination in 'the middle of nowhere, squared'. Despite this policy and their boss' determination, Joey "Tooch" Pantucci (Kevin J. O'Connor) and his girlfriend Leila (Una Damon) are less than impressed and hardly convinced that they are going to finish the job completely intact.

The focus shifts away from the small boat to the Argonautica; a veritable floating palace which has embarked 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 seasoned Captain Atherton (Derrick O'Connor). Mingling among the guests and taking full opportunity of the facilities and entertainment is Trillian, (Famke Janssen) a glamorous thief. The party reaches full swing as Canton delivers a speech, christening the ship and those sailing in her to 'good times, forever'.

With the crew and passengers occupied, Trillian makes her way toward and successfully enters the room containing the ship's safe, and the valuables within. She is removing the jewels when she is caught by Canton, Captain Atherton and two stewards. She is placed in a storeroom as the brig is currently incomplete.

The party races on, and it soon becomes apparent that the ship's navigational and communication systems have been brought down by a problem the crew cannot identify; and that the ship is running blind, leading Canton to go into hysterics.

The crewman manning the sonar brings an unusual object to their attention, and they can only watch with growing alarm as the object hurtles toward the ship from the ocean floor. Moments later the party, as well as the ship itself are brought to a sudden and violent stop. The sudden deceleration sends guests crashing to the floor and causes several of the ship's fittings to break loose; one of the loosened objects is a speed boat which drops harmlessly into the ocean. Reeling from the stop, the passengers begin to panic as a series of unusual sounds echo up from somewhere beneath the liner.

It is revealed that Finnegan's transport consists of a group of mercenaries who have been hired to rob the Argonautica's passengers and set them off safely before sinking the liner with a hastily installed torpedo launcher. The ship serves a secondary purpose as a floating garage as Finnegan's boat ploughed into the drifting speed boat, damaging his own ship's engine. Using information and schematics given to them by an insider, the team; led by Hanover (Wes Studi) boards the liner and enters the Main Atrium. However, all they find are the shattered remnants of the party and blood. Hanover orders the group to split up; he, Vivo (Djimon Hounsou), Mason (Clifton Powell), and Mulligan (Jason Flemyng) will find the vault; Finnegan and Joey are sent to the engine room to get the parts they need to repair their boat, with T-Ray (Trevor Goddard) and Mamooli (Cliff Curtis) standing guard.

As they explore each of the key sections of the ship they find signs of chaos everywhere. The lack of life make the team uneasy to the point of joking suggesting that the inside contact murdered everyone. After performing as much of the securing as they can manage, they head down to the safe room and find Trillian. Her escape was granted when she short circuited the electronic lock to the store room she was held in, and she intended to have another go at stealing the contents of the safe, this time using Canton's access card.

With the card in hand and Trillian being held by one of Hanover's men, the safe is unlocked and the contents revealed. Vivo is immediately killed accidentally by Canton who drives an axe into Vivo's head and two of the other pirates open fire into the vault killing three surviving passengers; leading to Canton and Captain Atherton being pulled out at gunpoint.

In the engine room, Finnegan and Joey witness Mamooli and T-Ray being dragged underwater by some unseen force, while back on Finnegan's boat, Leila and the mercenary who was watching her suffer a similar fate.

It is revealed that the ship has become infested by creatures that resemble giant worms, which swallow and digest their prey alive. Canton speculates that they are members of the Ottoia family of deep-sea worms which have evolved to immense size in the extreme depths of oceanic trenches. They know that the infestation is too large to kill with conventional weapons and so plan a drastic last ditch effort to stop it from getting to anyone else. They crash Finnegan's boat into the Argonautica. The boat is armed with one of the torpedoes belonging to the mercenaries. The creature is seen in the ship's main atrium where the monster bursts through the floor and grabs Finnegan, but is able to free himself by shooting the creature in the eye with a shotgun. It is revealed that the creatures are actually a single octopus-like creature which uses its many tentacles to digest prey. Finnegan and Trillian use a jet ski to escape the ship as it is destroyed.

The survivors are able to take a moment to relax on the only nearby island they saw during the night on the liner. They find out that one other survivor made it to shore, Joey. However it appears that this break will be short lived when a roar echoes across the island and something comes out of the nearby forest. The film ends on a shot of the island, and on Finnegan's tired exclamation: "Now what?"

[edit] Cast

[edit] Reception

The film received mostly negative reviews. A Rotten rating of 30% in Rotten Tomatoes based on 27 reviews, 0% of Top critics based on 5 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...."

[edit] Trivia

 Trivia sections are discouraged under Wikipedia guidelines.
The article could be improved by integrating relevant items and removing inappropriate ones.
  • Stephen Sommers began writing the script, then called Tentacle, when he worked at Hollywood Pictures in the mid-90s.
  • The cruise ship is named the Argonautica, a reference to Jason and the Argonauts, one of Stephen Sommers' favorite movies.
  • B-grade TV action movie Chain of Command made use of stock footage from Deep Rising, most notably shots of the exterior of the Argonautica, including the explosion sequences. This led to an obvious error which exposed the recycled footage: the name 'Argonautica' is seen clearly on the bow as the ship explodes; whereas the fictitious liner in Chain of Command where the President is being held captive is called the Su-Maru.
  • Claire Forlani was cast as Trillian St. James. She even started shooting, but walked out after just three days, due to creative differences with director Stephen Sommers. The part subsequently went to Famke Janssen.
  • Famke Janssen's character Trillian is named after the Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy character of the same name. Although here Trillian is her actual name, in Hitch-Hiker's it's short for Tricia McMillan.
  • The "Chinese M1 L1 triple-pulse assault rifles" used by the pirates are actually heavily modified Calico 960 submachine guns fitted with 100-round magazines (as opposed to the "thousand-round capacity" mentioned by Hanover). Five non-functional rotating barrels were built around the actual barrel like a Minigun of each Calico and driven by a small electric motor connected to the trigger, so that whenever the gun was fired, it appeared to be firing out of the rotating barrels.
  • Captain Atherton, played by Derrick O'Connor, was named after cinematographer Howard Atherton.
  • Harrison Ford turned down the role of Finnegan. The production's budget was then downsized.
  • Famke Janssen was almost not cast in this movie because the producers felt she was too recognizable from GoldenEye

[edit] External links

v • d • e
Films directed by Stephen Sommers

The Adventures of Huck Finn (1993) • The Jungle Book (1994) • Deep Rising (1998) • The Mummy (1999) • The Mummy Returns (2001) • Van Helsing (2004) • G.I. Joe (2009)