CORMAN MONSTER FLICKS SINK IN SILLY SCHLOCK

Shout! Factory continues to unleash an invasion of rarely seen Roger Corman Cult Classic titles, many appearing on DVD and Blu-ray for the first time and loaded with all-new bonus features. Corman built his career directing 50 films and producing over 350 on the foundation of truly independent filmmaking, sidestepping the restrictions of Hollywood's studio system to promote the creative talents of many leading directors, actors and writers. FilmEdge reviews the newest DVD/Blu-ray title additions to the growing library of Roger Corman Cult Classics which fans of indie cinema and rare releases will definitely want to add to their collection.

You'll need to be a hardcore Corman fan or collector to appreciate this monstrous UP FROM THE DEPTHS/DEMON OF PARADISE double feature salvaging a couple of cult not-so-classics on this single disc DVD release. Shout! Factory makes these vintage Corman-produced flicks look and sound fairly good considering their skimpy budgets and production challenges, but all-new anamorphic widescreen transfers can't improve the bizarre plots and characters of these watered-down 'JAWS FROM THE BLACK LAGOON' rip-offs.

Busy screenwriter in the Corman stable, Charles B. Griffith, helms the toothless UP FROM THE DEPTHS, a supposed 1979 sequel to the hit PIRAHNA which unleashes a prehistoric fish from the ocean floor to feed upon a menu of silly characters floundering in the waters of a Hawaiian resort. An undersea quake dredges up this giant shark-catfish hybrid which is so man-eatingly terrifying, it's hardly seen in the film at all. Apparently much of the underwater attack footage of the creature was so poorly shot that it couldn't be used, so expect a lot of bloody, bubbling water "death" scenes as the sea creature attacks.

The script by Anne Dyer and Alfred Sweeney thrashes to incoherent extremes, setting up a story about a shady but "lovable" scam artist (Sam Bottoms) who gets entangled in the body count as the monster attacks. That is until the resort director (Kedric Wolfe) sinks this horror-wannabe tale with his outrageous "comic" antics, alternately yelling at the only responsible adult investigating the killer fish (Susanne Reed) and ignoring the corpses piling up around his hoaky tourist paradise. These competing plots deflate any chance that the film with either horrify with its cut-away creature attacks or titillate with its exploitative glimpses of flesh. UP FROM THE DEPTHS is very little fish and all foul as a misguided JAWS copy mashed up most ridiculously with unfunny comedy and con man tales of sunken treasure. The absurd free-for-all hunt for the sea beast ending this mess elicits uncomplimentary belly laughs as all hell breaks loose in a disjointed melee of destruction and slightly slapstick humor.

The special features are slight as well in this Corman Cult Classics edition, with DEPTHS' new anamorphic widescreen 1.78:1 aspect transfer and a new Making of UP FROM THE DEPTHS featurette, which is really just an extended interview of recollections with Corman and special effects team Chris Walas and Robert Short intercut with production shots from the film — no actual making-of footage is included. The film's theatrical trailer, one TV spot and two radios spots round out bonus materials for this title.

Note: this DVD double feature offers a somewhat cool menu choice of watching both UP FROM THE DEPTHS and DEMON OF PARADISE as a Grindhouse-style continuous screening, even dropping in the vintage, delightfully cheesy "Coming Attractions" interstitial clips and trailers for other Corman movies. The trailer playlist includes FIRECRACKER ("the screen's first erotic Kung Fu classic!"), HUMANOIDS FROM THE DEEP, the women-in-prison sexploitation legend CAGED HEAT, and revenge melodrama JACKSON COUNTY JAIL. This added option makes a nice thematic treat for aficionados of gritty, grimy B-movies as seen in the dilapidated grindhouse theaters of the 1970s, and certainly sets the right tone (of deflated expectations) for this double bill. Even the DVD menu design mimics the poster displays and snack bar of a theater lobby before pushing through the swinging doors to enter the theater to start the show. It's a fun extra touch from Shout! Factory to add a bit more value to entice Roger Corman's devotees and collectors to buy this DVD.

Hardcore Corman fans might well prefer the first feature over its follow-up DEMON OF PARADISE, a 1987 genre-bending derivative borrowing heavily (if inartfully) from genuine creature feature classics such as JAWS and THE CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON among others. An ancient fish-man-monster-island-deity is awakened from its shallow-water nap by black marketeers dealing in stolen dynamite, as is so often the case in the Hawaii if you've ever vacationed there. Exploitation director extraordinaire, Cirio Santiago, besieges an unsuspecting island resort with explosives and drug trafficking plus this aquatic attacker to bedevil the uber-80s resort manager (Laura Banks). Once again the female lead (Kathryn Witt) is a scientist studying the legend of this presumably mythical monster, and the rise in local death rate prompts her to join forces with the island sheriff (William Steis) to get to the bottom of these seaside shenanigans. A hungry-for-a-buck reporter (Frederick Bailey) wants in on the big story, though he spends most of the film screaming all his dialogue which turns into a duet with the manager who matches him shriek for shriek. This is supposed to simulate actual dramatic tension but quickly becomes merely grating on viewers' ears and nerves. Witt and Steis counterbalance this max-volume angst in drastically underplayed performances which make the hunt for the man-eating Akua creature a foot-dragging quest when it needs to be a nail-biting chase.

Blame co-writers Santiago and Bailey for this mismatched jumble when plots collide as the story lurches back and forth between the black market smugglers, the lethargic scientist/sheriff demon hunt, and yet another silly subplot about a brainless supermodel lured to this dreary island for a photo shoot and good excuse to show her bare breasts. When the sheriff threatens to shut down the resort for safety, manager Cahill gets the ingenious idea to turn the recent bloody killings into a publicity stunt, exploiting the danger as a scavenger hunt game for the tourists!  Of course when the dynamite smugglers get cornered amid the big luau dinner, take hostages and get devoured by the fish-man, the tropical party is over and the tourists run for their lives. The military gets called in to help kill the creature which faces off with the sheriff, scientist and soldiers in a cave shoot-out. Injections of anti-monster serum fail to poison the monster, but a few lobbed hand grenades by soldiers blast the beast to bits. Gosh, if only the thread of smuggled dynamite cases threaded through the entire film had paid off ironically in the end when used to destroy the fish-man! No, that's just what audiences might expect. Better to call in the Marines at the end of the last reel and make our two heroes utterly ineffective in completing their mission!

Shout! Factory's new anamorphic widescreen 1.78:1 aspect transfer makes this schlockfest look much better than it deserves, though the audio track suffers at many points from poor dialogue recordings on location and some balance issues in the mix. Minor flaws aside, it's a handsome technical presentation of a sub-par movie. Aside from the Grindhouse double-feature presentation described above, no bonus features are offered for DEMON OF PARADISE besides its theatrical trailer. It's worth noting that the the four trailers seen in the Grindhouse continuous play mode can also be accessed individually from the Concessions price board in the theater lobby DVD menu, combined with all special features for both films.

While we applaud Shout! Factory for giving this ever-growing list of Roger Corman Cult Classics some very classy DVD releases, they can't be blamed when the films themselves fall far short of satisfying. This is definitely the case for their UP FROM THE DEPTHS/DEMON OF PARADISE Double Feature, which likely will appeal only to die-hard Corman fans and collectors who are compelled to fill their libraries with all available titles. Yet given the rarity of most if not all of these Corman films appearing in quality home video releases — with many devotees clinging to their old VHS copies of these flicks — the collectible appeal and opportunity of these DVD issues should not be underestimated. Shout! Factory no doubt counts on this factor, but time and again they have proven their commitment to sprucing up the Corman cult library with high-quality DVD editions, even if a few of the titles don't quite live up to their grand presentations. As long as you know what you're getting with this new 2-disc collection, be sure to enjoy a good whine with all this cinematic cheese.

FilmEdge rates ROGER CORMAN'S UP FROM THE DEPTHS/DEMON OF PARADISE 2 STARS based solely on the schlock factor of these two eerily and unfortunately similar monster flicks. You'll find much higher-rated titles in our growing collection of Roger Corman DVD reviews linked below for better viewing experiences, including the just-released Sci-Fi Triple Feature of ATTACK OF THE CRAB MONSTERS/WAR OF THE SATELLITES/NOT OF THIS EARTH.

RETURN TO THE ROGER CORMAN CULT CLASSICS MAIN MENU FOR MORE DVD REVIEWS