The Thing Below - Das Grauen lauert in der Tiefe

This film's plot is a rehash of Alien. Only here the evil critter is not found in outer space but fifteen miles under the Earth. Of course the US Government wants this thing, and wants to keep it hush hush, God knows why. Of course it gets loose on the oil platform where it was pulled out of the ground from and mayhem ensues.

One of the many problems is, the group of characters boarding the oil rig is straight out of the movie cliché handbook. The haunted leader, the bald black man, the inexplicable hot blonde chick, and the eccentric guy, who in this case thinks he's Butch Cassidy (including hat and six shooter).

Another is, this was made in Canada and many of the actors portraying Americans speak with a Doug and Bob MacKenzie accent, kinda weird eh? On the plus side, there is a far too long strip tease sequence performed by what looked to be an up and coming porn star (this accounts for my second star).

They obviously had some money to spend but the lousy acting, hokey cartoon alien and woeful, annoying "on the nose" dialogue drag this thing deeper than the underwater tomb their monster allegedly came from.

a drilling platform off the Gulf of Mexico raises the worst, most incompetent CGI sea creature that you're likely ever to see from deep under the ground. It breaks free of the containment that it's being held in and goes on a rampage. Apparently it can change people's perception of reality to (I have no clue either). The government is trying to keep this particular oil rig secret, if only the Producers of Jim Wynorski's latest in a LONG series of awful movies dating back to 1990 (when he made his last enjoyable film) opted to do the same thus sparing us 94 minutes of our lives that will never be returned. Avoid this incompetent trash like Paula Poundstone and you were an orphan. The thing is if it wasn't for the CGI it wouldn't be THAT bad. Don't get me wrong it would still suck, just not as much.

Eye Candy: Glori-Anne Gilbert dances topless for no reason whatsoever

My Grade: D-

This movie and its twin Deep Evil (2004) (TV) are painful to watch.

I won't go into too much detail or reiterate what others have written. I did watch the whole thing but my excuse is that I was watching this in the background while on the computer.

I kept on having deja vu while this played and I just could not put my finger on it - cheesy CGI, less than enthusiastic acting, and some other details.

The overall idea, some of the effects, scenery, bio-hazard outfits, black eyeballs, and "lumpy" skin all looked too familiar - I looked up the cast and crew for this movie and Ah ha! I had seen Deep Evil (2004) recently. They share so much: plot, effects, and one of the writers. Who knows maybe some of the footage got mixed up on the cutting room floor? Don't bother with the movie. Watch paint dry. (Or watch both movies and compare, for fun!)

There are no words to describe the absolute misery that this movie will subject you to. Before its end, you too would gladly welcome death.

The plot is awful. The CGI looks like it was hand-drawn onto the frames in production. The beginning credits attempt to be creative but butcher the intro. The same footage is shown over and over again, and most of it looks like it came from a 1980's 8bit video game.

What's worse is the insulting attempt to cover up how awful this film is by including a few busty women. If that's all you want from a movie, then you'll find it here. Just don't expect to be entertained.

If you're considering watching this movie, please don't throw away your life like that. Your time will be much better spent by watching that horrible Ewok movie that Lucas put out in '84. You deserve better than this.

*SPOILER ALERT* *SPOILER ALERT*

"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.