Tentacles (film)

''Tentacles'' (Italian title: ''Tentacoli'') is a 1977 Italian-American horror film directed by Ovidio G. Assonitis (billed in the U.S. version as Oliver Hellman) and starring John Huston, Shelley Winters, Bo Hopkins and Henry Fonda. When numerous people go missing in a seaside resort town, a reporter discovers a rampaging giant octopus is terrorizing the coast. While a marine biologist attempts to stop the octopus before more tourists fall victim to the creature, it appears that a corporation may be connected to the cephalopod's murderous behavior. Although the film was intended to cash in on the success of ''Jaws'', ''Tentacles'' also bears numerous resemblances to the 1955 science fiction giant monster horror film ''It Came from Beneath the Sea''.

Plot

People are turning up dead at Solana Beach, a seaside tourist resort, their skeletons picked clean of flesh and bone marrow. The local Sheriff (Akins) has no leads, but crusading newspaper reporter Ned Turner (Huston) suspects the construction of an underwater tunnel by the Trojan company, owned by Mr. Whitehead (Fonda). Whitehead threatens Turner to leave it alone, but after several more deaths, he interrogates killer whale trainer and marine expert Will Gleason (Hopkins). When two of Gleason's divers are also killed, Gleason goes to investigate himself and determines the attacks are the result of Trojan using ultrasonic drilling techniques where the sound waves have been "above regulated levels," which maddens a giant octopus, causing it to attack and devour human swimmers and boaters whenever it feels similar frequencies. Criticizing him for risking his life, his wife Vicky (Boccardo) joins her sister at the pool. When her sister goes off on a boating expedition and also goes missing, Gleason's wife goes in search...and is also killed by the octopus. In the meantime Turner's sister Tillie (Winters) has taken her young son to a boating race which he is one of the few to miraculously survive. Gleason vows to kill the octopus and takes his trained killer whales out to where his wife was killed. In the end, the octopus is killed by that pair of killer whales while he tries to save another diver.

Cast

* John Huston as Ned Turner
* Shelley Winters as Tillie Turner
* Bo Hopkins as Will Gleason
* Henry Fonda as Mr. Whitehead, President of Trojan Construction
* Delia Boccardo as Vicky Gleason
* Cesare Danova as John Corey
* Claude Akins as Sheriff Robards
* Alan Boyd as Mike
* Sherry Buchanan as Judy
* Franco Diogene as Chuck
* Marc Fiorini as Don

Production

The film was produced to capitalize on the success of Steven Spielberg's ''Jaws,'' and as such was produced on a much smaller budget of $750,000. It was shot on location in Oceanside, Pismo Beach, and San Diego, California. The aquarium sequences were shot at Marineland of the Pacific in Los Angeles County.

The film's score was done by Italian composer Stelvio Cipriani, who scored the similarly ''Jaws''-inspired films '' The Great Alligator'' and '' Piranha II: The Spawning'' around the same time.

Release

It was released theatrically by American International Pictures in Italy on February 25, 1977, The film opened in New York on 3 August 1977 and in Los Angeles on 31 August 1977.

The film was released on DVD by MGM in 2005 as part of their Midnite Movies series. The disc was a double feature release, pairing the film with ''Empire of the Ants''. It was released on Blu-ray by Kino Lorber in April 2022.

The film was a box office success, grossing $3,000,000.

Reception

On Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 0% based on seven reviews, with a weighted average rating of 2.6 out of 10.

Contemporary reviews were also negative. Lawrence Van Gelder of ''The New York Times'' called it "an all-too-familiar giant octopus movie" that suffered from "atrocious acting in minor roles," "occasionally poor dubbing" and "a totally unoriginal story". ''Variety'' noted that although " John Huston, Shelley Winters and Henry Fonda may bolster prospects", they "are all squandered in this one, thanks to a leaden script plus wooden direction by Oliver Hellman (who's also producer Ovidio Assonitiz)". Linda Gross of the ''Los Angeles Times'' dismissed it as "a tedious movie, nightmarishly slow and intermittently out of synch". Tom Milne of ''The Monthly Film Bulletin'' declared: "A devastatingly silly rehash of the ''Jaws'' formula, atrociously scripted, stiltedly acted, and reaching its low point in a grotesquely maudlin finale where the hero pours his heart out in a pep talk to the whales he has trained to graduate standards of communication". Marjorie Bilbow of '' Screen International'' wrote, "The special effects are good and there is a fair amount of suspense before each victim is tentacled. But involvement with the characters is minimal ... the excitement lies only in anticipating when the next plastic victim will get nabbed".

See also

* List of killer octopus films

References

Footnotes

Sources

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External links

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{{Ovidio G. Assonitis

1977 horror films
1977 films
American International Pictures films
Environmental films
Films about cephalopods
Films shot in California
Italian horror films
American monster movies
American natural horror films
1970s monster movies
Films set in the United States
Films scored by Stelvio Cipriani
English-language Italian films
1970s English-language films
1970s American films
1970s Italian films