Deep Shock (2003 TV Movie) User Reviews

Made-for-TV creature-horror film gone boring

[noizyme · 3/10 · 11 January 2006]

Deep Shock plays out like a TV movie: a whole cast of commercial-quality actors, a poorly designed creature to be the "bad guy," and a script that is more full of technical, political jargon and importances than it knows what to do with.

I checked out the movie because of the creature (I love to see what filmmakers have in mind for their designs in these cheaply made videos), and right off the bat, I got disappointed because the creature on the box was not the one in the movie. The actors I expected because of the type of film it is (really quite generic and not thought out past a certain point). The music was typical, not-thought-out action symphonic music.

I liked the design of the computers and technical equipment, along with the mini-sub design. The movie even flowed really well, with guiding screens letting you know which set you're watching the story unfold in. But there isn't much of a story here anyways.

This movie gets a 3/10 stars IMO. The boring search and destroy mission to blow up the North Pole and these creatures protecting it...kinda lame. Even lamer is the tagged-on love relationship between two of the characters that you don't see coming. Chalk this one up to being a movie which tries to get actors' careers off the bench and into a video. Don't bother.

Is the world poised for doom? Is this the eel deal?

[michaelRokeefe · 2/10 · 14 December 2003]

A mediocre Sci-Fi Channel original picture. A little squirmish, but not much. The nuclear powered submarine U.S.S. Jimmy Carter is on a mission deep below thick frigid ice near the North Pole when it is attacked by giant super charged electric eels. A member of the crew (Simmone Jade Mackinnon)thinks she has devised a way to communicate with the monsters, but is not given much chance for vague reasons. Also among the crew are:David Keith, Mark Sheppard and Sean Whalen. This movie could have been somewhat better if the eels/monsters were not so cartoonish.

Why oh why

[Totta · 4/10 · 9 April 2006]

I don't get this. The movie obviously has a pretty good budget. It has very good cinematography. It has nice pacing, good editing and pretty good directing too. Then WHY OH WHY didn't they hire someone to do a final rewrite of the script so it would not be so damn cheesy and WHY OH WHY did they hire such lousy actors that can't act their way out of a paper bag? This movie could have been good. At most times it LOOKS good and FEELS good but in the end, you realize that the movie was no good at all.

So I would say it's a good production but a bad movie. Too bad actually.

And eels? Come one, really!

Just plain bad

[gtc83 · 12 September 2004]

This is the story of giant electric eels, and maybe they're from another planet. I don't know. Everything is pretty vague. They're trying to melt the polar ice cap, apparently so more of them can come to take over the world. There's this female scientist who seems to think this is a marvelous idea, and basically she does everything she can to help them. She's the "hero" of the story. Yeah, pretty good stuff, huh? She also grins at everything. As another reviewer said, she gets fired, she grins. She thinks she's going to die, she grins. She concocts a plan so that the creatures can come back and wipe out mankind later - after she's had a chance to live her life. She grins. Did I mention she's our hero?

David Keith is in it too, playing the same exact character he plays in everything else he's been in lately.

Special effects aren't too bad in spots, but the eels are really silly looking. Looks like they ran out of money near the end and used unpaid interns to finish up the CGI. Acting is awful - the female lead really steals the show in that category but she had plenty of competition.

So in conclusion, if you're just dying to see a whole pile of cheap CGI and really couldn't care less if the story makes any sense or the acting is any good, hey, this is the film for you!

Shocking

[kk69782 · 1/10 · 17 June 2004]

This has to be the cheapest film made in 21st century. It is all the way low quality, but at the end it falls below... everything. All the cheap tricks - like flashing and darkness - are used to hide those crappy computer effects.

All the actors are below average, especially the main character Anne Fletcher (Simmone Mackinnon). There is a scene, where Anne is asked: "Why you seem so careless?" The correct answer is, because she can't act. No matter what happens (the world is about to be destroyed, her friend is dying, she is fired), she has the same stupid grin in her face.

It is not only the movie, which is B -quality. It is also the back cover description (at least in Finland). The text mentions things like Lorica Gray -vessel, Capital -vessel and main character Garrison Harper and Anna (not Anne) Fletcher. The description sounds like a different movie, both featuring character called Fletcher and sea monsters

Those stupid eels

[karl_consiglio · 1/10 · 30 November 2009]

Actually had to stop it. Don't get me wrong, love bad monster movies. But this one was way too boring, regardless of the suspenseful music that never leads you anywhere. The actress had too many teeth and that moment when she makes contact with one of the beasts, was way too obvious a cliché. This film totally betrays the cover on the DVD which looks pretty interesting. From the cover one expects a giant monster, but you get these cute not as gigantic as expected electric eels. Moved on to watch another film called The Killer Rats but that's another review. Deep Shock was really crap, a big shame considering the fact that it looks pretty high budget.

Deep Snore

[succotash · 1/10 · 14 January 2004]

Deep SH.. is more like it! The eels are just cartooned in over the film. Think "The Incredible Mr. Limpet" meets "Leviathan". Very tacky.

No character or relationship development. So called "romantic" scenes very corny and predictable. An interesting idea, but a poorly written script and LOUSY special effects make this a definite must-miss!

Currently the worst giant eel movie out there (see what I did there)

[movieman_kev · 1/10 · 23 April 2012]

After a attack submarine named after Jimmy Carter suffers a tragic fate (no its not attacked by a giant invisible bunny rabbit), the U.N argues about global warming, one female scientist and her ex who still wants to bang her (don't ask me why as she's a bit of a daft twit) go to investigate, where she meets up/emphasizes with giant ice-melting eels. The whole scenario seems a bit fishy to me.

If you actually find enjoyment in this cinematic excrement, you have to be seriously eel. It's no deep shock how electrifying bad this movie was going to be, but it was somehow much MUCH worse, I wanted to kEEL myself. By the end I only had my fish puns to keep my mind occupied, yes choosing to watch this was quite eel-conceived indeed.

My Grade: F

Bad Cartoon "eels" attack fake subs

[Billy-116 · 2/10 · 9 August 2003]

HORRID!!

The special effects make the TV version of "Tremors" look real!

No one in the cast can act.

Kind of like the '62 "Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea" meets the cartoon ocean going electric eel cartoons.

Attack of the giant super-eels with lightning bolt powers!

[Vomitron_G · 4/10 · 7 April 2011]

Well, I can only say the filmmakers tried, at least that's something... And I might also be rather too generous in my rating. But "Deep Shock" is at least worth a little bit more than its poor 1.9/10 IMDb rating (at the time I first saw it; apparently I was right, since it went up to 2.5/10 by now). The film is somewhat of a cross between "The Abyss" (1989) and maybe "Deepstar Six" (1989) and a zillion other "in the deep blue ocean" horror/sci-fi flickies. Juiced up with a lot of questionable CGI and a lame 'ex-wife/ex-husband get back together in the end' subplot. It gets a little credit for the background story that was given to the creatures and how they came to exist. But that's about it, really.

If you over look the cartoon CGI effects its pretty...ok.

[stormruston · 5/10 · 31 July 2004]

When I saw this movie at the store I was pretty sure the monsters would suck...a dead give away is cover art....they always draw the creature when the CGI is poor.I was not let down...these eel's blew chunks.

now onto the good parts.

I enjoyed the movie..I went into it knowing it would not have good special effects.The story was torn from 4 or 5 of the better "off the shelf SiFi plots for B movies hand guide" and it works fine.

The acting was not near as bad as some of the comments I have read here,i thought it was fine and I easily found myself interested in the survival of the characters.

this is a b- movie and it lives down to those standards...middle of the road overall.

A Very Nice Although Lower Budget Film! Certainly Worth The Watch!

[SouthernTrouble75 · 8/10 · 27 July 2014]

I know this film really got slammed in User Reviews, but if you approach this movie NOT expecting some new entirely new version of film, then I think you'll find you enjoy the film.

First of all, I don't think that there could be a completely new version of "what awaits us in the deep of the oceans" film. However, this film certainly adds a few new twists while not being some huge CGI film.

Other than a few shots, I would even say this is a family-safe film, for those who are not easily frightened. I wouldn't recommend for small children, but teenagers could certainly handle this with no problem.

And I must admit, I liked the "creature" in this film, it wasn't set out to be some horribly new creature that's supposed to scare us all to death at first site.

But as always, take the time to see the film for yourself! You may truly disagree with my opinion... but then, that's the great thing about living in our society... everyone has an opinion and can voice it!

Take it easy, ya'll!

ST75

begins dreadful; radically improves

[justinmo-1 · 6/10 · 10 May 2006]

This movie surprised me, after coming close to forward speeding it by 8 times after 45 minutes of lousy acting, ill conceived SF premise and virtual GI-Joe intellectual and philosophic discussion; it gradually and weirdly takes on a life of its own and ends as half a very interesting and credit worthy SF adventure and exploration. The female lead for a while stops just looking like Katherine Hepburn but starts acting like her as well, and though it isn't much and the animation is borderline shlock-horror comic the whole cooked up alien contact eco-catasrophe, deep sea adventure mish mash works a bit in the end. Surprisingly enjoyable!

I'm in deep shock after watching this movie!

[TheLittleSongbird · 1/10 · 29 July 2012]

The idea was preposterous in the first place, but I saw it anyway out of interest to see how bad it would be and whether it would be something to revel in the awfulness of it all. No such luck! Deep Shock doesn't even have the so-bad-it's-good factor, just so-bad-it's-bad. Bad doesn't even describe what I consider one of the worst movies I've seen in a long time. Visually, Deep Shock looks terrible, with choppy editing and too-dark lighting. But they are nothing compared to the effects of the eels, their giant sock-puppet-like appearances would be more at home in a cartoon or something, and because of the way they look they exude no menace or even quirky fun. The music score manages to be overbearing too, with sluggish tempos, obtrusive and obvious orchestration and melodically nothing standing out at all. The writing is just as awful, whether in tense, humorous or romantic moments it all feels very forced and stilted. And it seems as though the actors know that, as nobody is good, often reading of playing themselves. David Keith is playing the same role here than he has been in a lot of his movies of late, and it's getting old. The story has no life to it whatsoever and feels predictable and contrived all the time, while the characters are dull as dishwater and clichéd. In conclusion, a soggy mess. 1/10 Bethany Cox

I was shocked all right

[Dr. Gore · 21 November 2003]

*SPOILER ALERT* *SPOILER ALERT*

It could have been so simple. You rent a flick called "Deep Shock" and expect giant eels to be attacking. Well, that's what I expected. Instead I got a hokey, moronic, painful waste of a movie. Who was in charge of quality control for this stink burger? Yuck-o. Shockingly terrible.

Giant glowing eels attack an underground station. The UN sends the usual plucky scientist to investigate. The eels looked like the dragon from "Never Ending Story". They did not look like eels. They shoot lightning bolts out of their heads! What? Wait...What? What is that about? These are super eels. How super you ask? The scientist creates a computer program to talk to the eels!! YES!! Instant messaging with eels! AAAAAAHHHHH!!!

This movie is as lame brained as it gets. I was in agony watching it. The monsters turn out to be misunderstood eels and the humans are wretched for not trying to understand them and their eel ways. If there is one lesson I can impart on monster movie filmmakers, it is this: MONSTERS ARE THERE TO BE KILLED. THEY ARE THE BAD GUYS. THEY ARE NOT THERE TO BE PETTED LIKE A PUPPY DOG OR OTHERWISE SYMPATHIZED WITH!

This movie was made for only one purpose: To show off their lame computer special effects. Over half the movie is spent having characters look at computer screens. Whoop-dee-doo. The eel flick needed lots of computer screen shots with diagrams of subs, stations and whatever else was in chaos.

Send this flick down into the eel trench. They might like it. All humans should avoid.

A low budget movie, but still alright.

[timpe_dumle · 5/10 · 18 December 2003]

It's not the best movie ever made, but it is far from bad. The effect are a bit outdated for a movie made in 2002, but it is still exciting and a nice little piece to watch on a weekday when you don't have any other films to watch.

If you don't mind some lame computer animated scenes, it's actully quite exciting.

Ok? I guess, who can tell?

[drystyx · 3/10 · 15 October 2021]

3/10 is the rating for non memorable movies, which include muddled messes like this one.

It's not depressing or negative enough to be a 1 or 2 out of 10 hate movie, but who knows?

I can't begin to tell you what it's about. Even reading subtitles gave no clue.

People in some kind of submarine. "Polaris" keeps appearing on screen, so maybe they're in a Polaris, whatever that means.

Unless you're a career Navy person, you can't possibly understand the high tech lingo.

Some eels and horse looking creatures underwater. No explanation to anyone but the 5%.

Visuals look good, but each frame is unexplained as to how the scenes relate to each other. Makes one think that this was just a storybook with no inspiration, as is the way with drawing artists. Like a comic book, perhaps.

One should never draw a storyboard before one writes the story for it. That guarantees zero inspiration and zero strategy.

Not so good.

[virginia-gorg · 2/10 · 22 April 2023]

Rather shallow movie and the lead girl (Ann) is really annoying. She's the only one who can fix everything. I am so tired of movies that make one person the hero and everyone else stupid. Graphics are mediocre. Sad, because the storyline could have made a good movie. This just falls short in so many ways. It's predictable, borderline boring, and leaves much to be desired.

No spoilers in this review except to say it could have been so much better. Even if the graphics had stayed poor, the story could have been vastly improved to create suspense and a level of reality. Watch at your own risk. !

If In doubt Nuke It

[JCX94 · 2/10 · 29 May 2020]

A tv movie that's Abyss meets Sphere with a little bit of Deep Rising thrown In for good measure. This movie was bad, like It got to the point where I was so annoyed with every single character In this movie that I started rooting the creatures.

The only reason I'm giving 2* Instead of 1* Is Mark Sheppard(Crowely from Supernatural), he played his character perfectly, the only good thing about this movie.

If you didn't know It was made In 2003 like me you'd think this was made In the late 80's early 90's.

Sock Puppets! MST3K worthy!

[clichekiller12 · 1/10 · 17 March 2008]

This was one of the worst movies EVER!!!!!!!! It was so bad, I was laughing through the WHOLE movie! The plot was SO cheesy; especially the end. This movie turns from an end-of-the-world-disaster to save-the-eels! I mean, c'mon! And I swear...I think they use SOCK PUPPETS for the eels! And there was this horrible kiss scene in the middle with the two main characters who happened to be divorced. How predictable! It was SO terrible that my mom, my sister, and I couldn't finish it, and when we DID finish it, it was about a year later! The second time we watched it and we finished it this time, we did MST3K-like comments throughout the movie.

Summary: Only watch this if you're a movie basher! Make hilarious comments, watch this at a sleepover for laughs, and I mean HUGE laughs. Also watch for mockery. The metaphor that explains this movie: This movie is a very shallow field full of cheese and sock puppets!

Huh?

[ApolloBoy109 · 21 August 2003]

Last week I had some minor surgery and had to watch TV. As the previous reviewer stated the Sci-Fi channel loves putting thier 'original' movies onSunday night at 9:00. Maybe because they think no one is watching.

Lately Sci-Fi is not content to just run movies and TV shows, they want to be movie makers. Having seen most of them, I conclude they need to stop it. This movie (and it really isn't a movie, more like an episode of a Twilight Zone-like anthology series) was just bad karma from the first word.

Paint by numbers.

The script was difficult to follow. Seriously I didn't really understand what was going on for most of it. The only clues I had were the rip-off characters from the Abyss, and of course the 'arch evil' corporate, government, mad scientist (insert here) bad guy. Boy, ever since Alien 2 we've always had the Paul Reiser character in every sci-fi tale.

Anyway, the movie was as bad as it's CGI creatures, and had nothing to offer a sci-fi fan.

Not as bad as it sounds

[vchimpanzee · 27 July 2009]

Near the North Pole, the submarine U.S.S. Jimmy Carter encounters some mysterious objects in the water. It is, of course, impossible for such objects to be truly unknown, so when he can't get answers, the commanding officer just yells in order to get better results.

We don't know exactly what happens, but it can be concluded that it was something terrible. The next thing we see is two scientists--Chomsky and Dr. Anne Fletcher--arguing at a United Nations auditorium over whether there is global warming.

The Hubris, an underwater station, is attacked as well, possibly by the same unknown objects. One crew member pulls a gun in an effort to stop an unwise retaliation whose results are unpredictable. And then whatever happened to the Jimmy Carter happens to them, supposedly. Chomsky, Fletcher and Fletcher's ex, Capt. Andy Raines, are on the team sent to investigate.

The airplane landing at the North Pole is kind of rough (they tell us it's the North Pole, but there's no land there in reality, and yet there is a runway with lights somewhere).

The group boards the Hubris and finds everyone dead, but amazingly, once they get the power back, everything works perfectly. Now they just have to find the cause of what happened. Meanwhile, the United Nations sees only one way to solve the problem: a full-blown nuclear attack. This includes the Jimmy Carter (what, there were two? Oh, maybe they fixed it).

The rest of the movie consists of arguments over how best to handle what Dr. Fletcher determines are electric eels from another planet who regard Earth as theirs and humans as "intruders". Communication with the outside world is disrupted and must be repaired, but it doesn't really matter because the United Nations won't listen to reason. There are some pretty exciting battle scenes and suspense as we wonder if the crew can somehow stop the United Nations.

This movie is pretty much what you'd expect, but some of it is actually better. I thought Capt. Raines and Dr. Fletcher had a couple of pretty good scenes, and Capt. Raines has a nice smile. Their subordinates provide comedy relief, and Chomsky is just a stubborn grouch.

The alien creatures look good, for Saturday morning. But this is live-action and you would hope they'd be realistic.

There is, of course, an important moral here. Aliens may not be as evil as you think, but you just have to know how to deal with them. Most people aren't that patient or knowledgeable. Not something we haven't seen before, though.

It's not too bad if you need something lightweight.

Not deep... not shocking.

[Kevbo · 9 August 2003]

Yup... another sea creature, oil rig, military tries to deal with creature hamfistedly type straight to video affair. But if you like movies about huge electric eels resembling the creature on the cover of Asia's first album... than this is for you. Especially if you're holding a David Keith film festival. Plenty of drama and tension to be had but the cheap cg sea creatures (say that 5 times fast) are too hokey to provide payoff or menace. Not the worst thing out there for sure but it's nothing you haven't seen already in the last 15-20 years: The Abyss, Deep Star Six, Leviathan etc. etc. All that's really missing is a lesser Baldwin brother.

Different kind of sea monsters!

[Movie Nuttball · 6 March 2004]

This movie looked good according to the excellent picture on box and it was an exciting film that stars one of My favorite actors David Kieth. It was not what I thought it was though. With these giant electric eels which really looked like dragons it made the film unusual. The acting was good and the effects looked good. The music by Richard McHugh was good! Speaking of the music, I noticed that some of it especially in the first part in the main title which is also located in the beginning of the end credits sounds much like the score for The Fly II composed by Christopher Young! Its really neat music and I found it strange that it sounded alike! Though the movie may not be the best film or the best of its kind or it maybe really disappointing due to the huge creature on the box isn't in the film but give it a watch if you are a fan of David Kieth and/or the genre!

Heavy orchestrations bow down the film

[fredk_us · 9 August 2003]

Sci-Fi Channel offers this lugubrious, insensitive and heavily-orchestrated North Pole would-be horror flick that is just slow enough to irritate and flashing enough lights to induce a kind of I-Don't-Care-to-Get-It epilepsy.