"The Thing Below" review

The Thing Below (2004)

Directed by Jim Wynorski
Writing credits Raul Inglis William Langlois

Billy Warlock .... Capt. Jack Griffin
Kurt Max Runte .... Crank Wowchowski
Catherine Lough Haggquist .... Anna Davis
Glori-Anne Gilbert .... Cindy Mayberry

"The Thing Below" is a completely unnecessary movie. I didn't need to see it and no one needed to spend two seconds making it. In fact, I would dare say that no one should have even thought about making it. I rented it expecting a cheap "Deep Rising" rip-off. It's a sad day when your movie watching hopes are dashed because they weren't low enough. I thought mine couldn't possibly get any lower. A "Deep Rising" rip-off was asking too much? Yes. Yes it was.

"The Thing Below" starts off with the usual B-movie scientists doing stupid things in an isolated setting. This time they're on an oil rig and let loose The Thing Below. A cargo ship arrives to check out the situation. Then the movie spins off into oblivion as the monster is not a beast with fangs, tentacles and other cool monster appendages but some sorry telepathic creature that can read your mind and exploit your fears, hopes, dreams etc. This leads to a scene where the monster turns into Glori-Anne Gilbert so it can do a strip tease for one of the crew members and another scene where there's an Old West style shootout (?!).

I'm sure once the filmmakers saw the quality of their monster special effects, (terrible, awful, etc), they decided to take the telepathic creature route. It didn't really matter which monster they chose because there's no suspense, no thrills and pretty much nothing below. Well, nothing worth getting excited about that's for sure. Any way you look at it, this movie needs to be tossed away and forgotten.

SCORE: LANDFILL