Terror Beneath the Sea
Entry updated 16 June 2025. Tagged: Film.
Japanese/US film (1966; vt Water Cyborg; vt Agent X-2: Operation Underwater; vt Battle Beneath the Sea). Directed by Hajime Sato. Written by Kōichi Ōtsu. Cast includes Shin'ichi "Sonny" Chiba, Franz Gruber, Andrew Hughes, Peggy Neal and Erik Neilson. 84 minutes (Japan); 79 minutes (US). Colour.
Journalists aboard a submarine watching the demonstration of a new homing torpedo appear to glimpse an underwater man on the television monitor. Two of them, Ken Abe (Chiba) and Jenny Gleason (Neal), later go scuba diving at the site of the test, which happens to be close to an island used as a nuclear waste disposal site (see Nuclear Energy). Jenny is separated from Ken when she loses her camera; retrieving it she sees a humanoid sea Monster, taking a photo before dropping it again. Nearby, at the disposal site, Professor Howard (Hughes) is concerned by a strange footprint found on the island, handing Lieutenant Colonel Brown (Gruber) a plaster cast and asking him to investigate. Doing so, the naval officer re-watches the tv footage and is puzzled: "If it is a man, where is its diving equipment?"
Brown dismisses Jenny's story; she and Ken go to retrieve the camera, only to be captured by the sea creatures and taken to the base Under the Sea of Doctor Rufus Moore (Neilson). Prone to a Mad Scientist laugh, he talks of current speculation that the future will involve a world "united under one totalitarian government; it is my desire to create such a civilisation, by first creating the citizens who will inhabit it." (See Dystopia; Near Future; Politics.) His Scientists have developed a formula that can change a person's body and mind to suit any purpose (resulting in a "processed man"); the "water Cyborgs", as Moore calls them, are an example. We watch one created, which includes the surgical replacement of lungs with gills: "Their minds – if you can call them minds – are memory banks with information fed into them – and controlled by us." (See Slavery.) Moore asks Ken to work for the propaganda side of his organisation: he refuses, so he and Jenny are condemned to become water cyborgs.
Fortunately Brown – guilty that his scepticism caused them to go back into the sea – has joined a submarine searching for the missing pair; as it approaches the base Moore fires torpedoes – which are avoided – and Brown responds in kind. The base is badly damaged, including the water cyborg control panel – the creatures duly run amok. Amidst the chaos, and joined by Professor Howard (who had also been kidnapped), Ken and Jenny make their escape. Further urgency is added when they notice the base's atomic pile will shortly explode; helpfully there is a count-down from 100. Moore is confronted and killed. The trio depart in an escape capsule as the base explodes; later Howard is able to cure the other two from the early stages of their transformation into water cyborgs.
This is a poor film, dull and Clichéd. Low-budget Japanese sf and Horror movies usually make imaginative use of their limited resources. This is not the case here: the water cyborgs are unimpressive and the plot inept and padded, with undisciplined action scenes and a lacklustre Villain. Terror Beneath the Sea attempts to cash in on the James Bond-type thrillers of that era; its lack of personality removes much – though not all – of the enjoyment that might be had from watching it as a bad film. [SP]
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