drmality-1

I stumbled across this obscure Hammer pirate adventure on Tubi and was greatly entertained by it. The premise is a novel one...a ship of bloodthirsty pirates joins the Spanish Armada on their unsuccessful attack on England. Sustaining damage, the ship deserts the Armada and winds up aground in the remote English marshes near a small village. Led by Christopher Lee's morose Captain Robeles, the pirates convince the villagers that Spain has conquered England and set up shop in the town, using the villagers as slave labor to fix their ship. But things don't go as smoothly as the pirates hoped...

The movie has a great pace and the action never lags for long. When things are in danger of slowing up, a sword fight or a barroom brawl breaks out. Led by sturdy Andrew Keir, the villagers are scheming up a revolt right from the get-go, leading to some brutal retaliation by the pirates. The villagers find an unexpected aid from a disgruntled Spanish nobleman who is revolted by Robeles' cruelty.

Don Sharp was always a good action director who made the most of a low budget and "Devil Ship Pirates" is no different. The cast is very game, with Lee and Keir dominating. John Cairnley, later to be "Jason and the Argonauts", is a fiery young villager who leads the revolt. He gets whipped almost to shreds, but leaps back into action with superhuman vigor. Keep an eye out for Hammer mainstay Michael Ripper as the weaselly pirate Pepe.

OK, not an Oscar contender, but as a low budget period action flick, this worked really well for me.

I saw this film when I was very young and it left quite an impression. The weird "pinging" soundtrack (also found on "The Angry Red Planet" and "Invisible Invaders") always stuck in my head. But I never forgot the monster! One of the coolest "undersea" creatures ever created. I put him right behind The Creature From the Black Lagoon as an aquatic "man in a suit" creature. The underwater scenes with him in particular look great.

The movie itself is average but far from the disaster some others here make it out to be. It looks very much like a "made for TV" movie and seems in many ways like an episode of "Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea". There's no shame in that.

As for the cast, they are all sturdy pros, with Scott Brady playing a typical hard-nosed military man. It gives us a chance to see Mike Road, the voice of "Race Bannon" on "Jonny Quest", in the flesh as a diver concealing a tragic secret. I always liked Gary Merrill and Sheree North is real easy on the eyes as a token love interest. One part that is really embarassing is veteran Asian actor James Hong's appearance as a totally cliched Chinese cook. That character should have been left on the cutting room floor.

A painless 90 minutes of entertainment with an outstanding monster and good underwater photography.