2
(nothing substantial)
7
(mild and implied violence)
4
(take it or leave it)
If I hadn’t known better I might have thought Phantom From 10,000 Leagues was a Roger Corman movie. He seems to like making bad movies about silly looking sea monsters. This one centers around an oceanography lab. There’s a beam of radiation shooting up from the sea floor and a sea serpent that looks an awful lot like a guy in a goofy mask “guarding” it.
Corpses and rowboats are washing ashore on a regular basis, scorched by radiation. An FBI agent and a scientist try to figure out what’s going on and who’s behind it all. It’s not just a simple matter of investigating a monster, though. A spy ring is causing trouble on the mainland. They want the nuclear research from the oceanography lab. They kill on land as the monster kills at sea.
This flick is right on the verge of being interesting particularly with the conflicts between the scientists and investigators. There’s an uncertainty about who’s responsible for what, particularly when the spy ring crimes surface. Maybe there’s more than one villain, maybe this is all accidental.
Another plus is that the acting is not too bad. Kent Taylor stands out, but most of the others range from decent to pretty good. There’s a love story mixed in (as there so often is) between Lois King, the daughter of the head professor at the lab, and Ted (Mr. Taylor's character). While it’s not poorly done at all it walks the line of the idea that Ted suspects Prof. King of being complicit in some of the dastardly events which Lois can’t tolerate. This is a kind of triangle that has become a suspense movie cliché. That doesn’t necessarily make it bad just unoriginal.
What really holds the movie back is the monster, not the concept but the execution. The monster attacks, which most of the movie centers around, are downright goofy. The monster looks terrible, its motivation – protecting the radiation beam – is kind of dumb, and its attacks amount to tipping over boats which, when they wash up on shore, turn out to be the same rowboat each and every time no matter what boat was described in the report of the attack. You’d think people in row boats would start avoiding that area after a while.
Morality
There’s very little to worry about in this movie. I didn’t notice any strong language at all. There’s nothing sexual or revealing. There is some lethal but mostly implied violence. We see one or two people get shot with harpoons. The monster attacks are little more than people falling in the water when their boats get bumped.
Spirituality
This isn't a particularly deep movie. There are no spiritual aspects to the monster or the events that happen. At most this can be seen as a cautionary tale about men trying to play God.
Final Thoughts
This is not a movie to worry about tracking down, but if you stumble across it and like old black-and-white monster movies you might enjoy it. I would think more highly of it if they had done a better job with the sea monster attacks – both the action and the depiction of the aftermath.
Buying Guide
"Phantom From 10,000 Leagues" doesn't quite have the overwhelming number of releases that some similar movies do, but there are still a lot to consider. I'll help you figure out what's what.
There are several DVD releases with one of them being a “Collector's Edition.” You're more likely to find this included in any number of multi-movie packs with other goofy monster flicks. I have a couple of those packs myself which I'll compare below.
So what makes the “collector's edition” an ideal edition for collectors? Absolutely jack squat as far as I can tell. They put that label on all kinds of crap hoping you'll buy it over the other releases available without doing any research. This has the same specs as all the others with no mention of remastering or extras.
That also applies to all the releases I found. There is nothing special about any of them so you can get an idea about quality and offerings by reading about the versions I've seen.
Final Recommendation:
Neither of the budget pack transfers is great but neither is unbearably horrible. The 50 pack's quality is a bit better than the other one. I would expect to see similar quality in the other releases available out there unless and until someone decides to remaster it.
The first one I'll look at is from the Horror Classics 50 pack.
Video
1.33:
There is no widescreen version available. The image has some trash and is shaky (not severe but persistent). It's not not as sharp as it could be but is otherwise OK.
Audio
2.0 mono:
The levels are a little muted, but it has decent mix and is pretty clean with not much white noise.
Packaging
This particular disc is housed in a cardboard sleeve contained in a Velcro-fastened box (more recently repackaged in plastic). You can read about the set as a whole in great detail in the Horror Classics (50 pack) guide.
Extras
There are none.
Next up is the Chilling 20 pack.
Video
1.33: It has kind of a jittery image which is annoying. There's some trash, and it's a little too dark at times. It's pixelated and grainy.
Audio
2.0 mono: Again this is somewhat muted making some of the sound effects like the water barely audible. There are minor pops here and there, but there's no white noise to speak of.
Packaging
The disc comes in a paper sleeve that lives in a plastic case. You can get more details about the set as a whole by checking out the Chilling (20 pack) guide.
Extras
None for this one, either.