CAPTAIN NEMO AND THE UNDERWATER CITY

U.K. | 1969 Directed by James Hill Starring Robert Ryan Chuck Connors Luciana Paluzzi Color | 105 Minutes | G Format: DVD-R (NTSC) Warner Archive Collection

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	Review by Brian Lindsey Film:3 DVD:4

Neither an adaptation of Jules Verne’s classic science fiction novels nor a prequel/sequel to them, Captain Nemo and the Underwater City takes his most famous character and plops him in the middle of a creaky, chintzy kiddie flick. In contrast, the enduring film versions of Verne's 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea and Mysterious Island (as interpreted by Walt Disney and Ray Harryhausen, respectively) are ‘all ages’ fare — offering something for everyone in the audience be they eight or eighty. Underwater City sets a much lower goal, unfortunately, and fails to attain even that.

During the American Civil War, U.S. senator Robert Fraser (Chuck Connors, Kill Them All and Come Back Alone) is crossing the Atlantic on a special diplomatic mission to convince European powers not to sell munitions to the Confederacy. As it approaches Ireland, the schooner he’s aboard is caught in a terrible storm and starts to break apart. While making for the lifeboats Fraser and five other passengers — a widow and her young son, a panicky Englishman and two con artist brothers — are tossed into the raging sea, seemingly to drown with no hope of rescue. Their limp, unconscious forms sink into the depths when salvation miraculously appears... Frogmen garbed in ‘futuristic’ diving gear, crewmen of the advanced submersible Nautilus.

Her commander, the mysterious Captain Nemo (Robert Ryan, The Wild Bunch), isn't pleased about taking strangers aboard but, despite his avowed misanthropy, couldn't just stand by and let them drown. Nonetheless he tersely informs the survivors that they will never be allowed to return to the surface. To preserve his fantastic technological secrets they must spend the rest of their lives in Nemo's undersea world. That world, however, is not limited to the confines of the Nautilus… The great genius has constructed an entire city on the ocean floor! The domed citadel, called Templemir, is completely self-sustaining in terms of oxygen, food and energy requirements, and is populated by Nemo’s devoted followers and their families. Whether they like it or not, the senator and his companions are to become permanent residents...

I watched this film on TV when I was 10 years old, and it's rather amusing to look back and think about the kind of stuff that could fill me with awe and wonder in those days. Captain Nemo and the Nautilus! An underwater city! A monster manta ray called Morbula! (Yes, this movie features a giant sea beast to menace Nemo and crew; as Fraser states after learning of the creature, "So, even Utopia has its hazards.") There's no point in hashing over how times have changed, or what the advent of MTV and home video have done to children's entertainment; suffice to say that 30-40 years ago kids were a much more innocent, naive audience — certainly a less demanding one. But we also had to use our imaginations more, and that, I think, is the key reason why even creaky chestnuts such as this are sometimes invested with a sense of nostalgia.

Despite plot concerns with the limits of benevolent dictatorship and a sappy love triangle — Connors' character vies with Nemo's second-in-command (John Turner) for the affections of Templemir's hottest swimming instructor (Thunderball's Luciana Paluzzi) — Captain Nemo and the Underwater City is aimed squarely at the kiddie matinee crowd. The filmmakers don't even make half-assed attempts at scientific veracity, since the children in the audience wouldn't know the difference anyway. (Which is why divers swim around in scuba gear 10,000 fathoms [60,000 feet!] beneath the sea... Doubtless Jules Verne did a few spins in his grave over that one.) Yet none of that should really matter in a fantasy film provided there's plenty of spectacle and adventure. But that's exactly where the movie falls short.

Understandably this is a completely stage-bound production, so it isn't helpful that the sets are either TV-series quality (Capt. Nemo as guest villain on The Wild Wild West) or just plain cheesy. Special effects are quite dreadful — Templemir could've come from some kid's play-set, the submarines look like toys and Morbula the Monster Manta Ray (hooray!) is a rubbery letdown. Ditto the costuming, which is often ridiculous; the laughably ornate scuba fashions seem courtesy of the Liberace Sportswear Collection, while one of the ne'er-do-well brothers spends most of the film attired like a Munchkin from The Wizard of Oz. Somehow maintaining their dignity throughout, Robert Ryan and Chuck Connors (the latter in Elvis bouffant and sideburns) nonetheless give good performances, aware that most of the film's budget went to hiring them. Ryan is still too quintessentially American for the Nemo role, however, falling short in comparison to the likes of James Mason and Herbert Lom.

Another offering from the overpriced but high-quality 'burn to order' DVD-R Warner Archive Collection. The anamorphic 2.35:1 transfer looks pretty good, boasting strong colors and little in the way of print damage; the mono audio track is likewise quite solid. A battered theatrical trailer (as an "MGM Children's Matinee" presentation) is tossed in as an extra.

So no real complaints for this decent treatment of an all-but-forgotten catalog title. Even so, the disc should be at least five dollars cheaper than it is. 3/02/10

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