Call me a cephalophile. Or an octo-enthusiast. Either one speaks to my obsession with the octopus in film.
It is such a dramatic creature with those eight elongated tentacles that even a brief appearance can jolt a movie awake. An octopus lurking in a cave is like a killer in a closet. “Run!” you want to scream. “Run!”
The giant octopus film is one of my favorite genres. I watch these movies on repeat, marveling at the size of the sea creature and how those tentacles work as separate appendages to find victims no matter where they run.
But things got complicated for me in May when scientists discovered the most adorable tiny blue octopus near the Galapagos Islands. The little cutey is only the size of a golf ball. Then Netflix released the drama “Remarkably Bright Creatures” starring an octopus named Marcellus who is a showstopper. (Don’t yell at me yet, this ties into classic movies.)
Neither looks like the monsters I’m used to seeing in movies. One fits in the palm of your hand, the other in an aquarium tank. When Marcellus colorfully unfurls himself, he is majestic. For the first time I saw the true beauty of an octopus and could admire it for the magnificent creature it is, despite Marcellus being created via visual effects.
Marcellus, who narrates the film, is nonviolent, smart and kind as he helps two lonely people, an elderly widow (Sally Field) and a lost young man (Lewis Pullman), find their way.
Now I feel feel guilty for loving the killer octopus movies of classic cinema. But I can’t help it. Even presented as a monster, the octopus is a splendid creature. Watch it wrap its tentacles around the Golden Gate Bridge in It Came From Beneath Sea. See it clutch a submarine in Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea. Look as it rises during the full moon in The Monster on the Ocean Floor (OK, it looks a bit lame). The octopus deserves our respect.
Yes, I know the killer octopus is not based in reality. There is no recording of one killing a human. And though there are gigantic ones deep in the ocean, they stay at those great depths. The legends about the octopus-like Kraken and devil fish that killed sailors are just legends, but they live in our imaginations. (Wasn’t the mythical Kraken great in Clash of the Titans and Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest?)
In film, the octopus and its close relative the squid (there is a difference) continue to entertain, terrorize and captivate moviegoers. Sometimes they are the star as in It Came from Beneath the Sea, the 1955 film that showcased Ray Harryhausen’s groundbreaking stop-motion animation work. But a quick cameo is enough to be memorable such an attack on young Robert Wagner in Beneath the 12-Mile Reef (1953) and John Wayne’s two underwater encounters in the adventure films Reap the Wild Wind (1942) and Wake of the Red Witch (1948). (Sadly, it didn’t always turn out well for Wayne.)
A quick cameo can be used for comic relief such as Bob Hope’s amusing meeting with a squid in Road to Bali (1952). Or it’s pure entertainment like the animated octopus serenading Esther Williams in Dangerous When Wet (1953).
THE OCTOPUS DEBUT
“Look!! An octopus has got him.”
And with those chilling words, read on an intertitle, the first octopus was seen on film in the 1916 adaptation of Jules Verne’s 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.
Though visionary filmmaker Georges Méliès was the first to adapt the Jules Verne novel with his 1907 short, this 1916 film was the first full-length adaptation. This was also the first full-length movie filmed underwater through the work of pioneering undersea photographers George and J. Ernest Williamson. (However, it was not filmed with an underwater camera since that technology was still to come.)
This film blends elements of two Verne novels – 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea and Mysterious Island – omitting quite a bit of both stories but keeping the recognizable Captain Nemo and Nautilus submarine.
The octopus scene is brief and the creature is barely larger than the diver it is attacking but think about how thrilling it must have been to see this 1916! The film was made over two years by Universal Film Manufacturing Co., meaning it could be considered a Universal monster film! It was selected for the National Film Registry in 2016.
Thirteen years later, the octopus would re-emerge in another adaptation of a Verne novel, the 1929 film “The Mysterious Island” when “underwater men” unleashed “a sluggish monster of terrific strength.”
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea was filmed multiple times. The most famous version is the 1954 Disney Technicolor film with a great cast led by Kirk Douglas, James Mason and Peter Lorre. The giant squid is worthy of the killer designation with tentacles so long they wrapped around the Nautilus and attack multiple men at once. It’s a rollicking sci-fi adventure.
Here are more films to consider.
It Came from Beneath the Sea(1955)
This is the granddaddy of them all, filled with iconic images created by Ray Harryhausen of an octopus attacking boats, beaches and cities. Blame the bomb for this gigantic creature that was forced to rise from the sea in search of food after turning radioactive. The film teases with glimpses of a tentacle here or there, then shows the full power of the beast when it attacks San Francisco, destroying Fisherman’s Wharf and the Golden Gate Bridge, and crushing everything in its way. That’s despite the fact it only had six tentacles due to budget constraints. (Harryhausen called it his “sixtopus.”)
There is an awkward romantic triangle between scientists played by Faith Domergue and Donald Curtis and a brash military commander played by Kenneth Tobey. It would be a better film without this subplot that never feels right.
Monster from the Ocean Floor (1954)
This giant squid film is important to movie history because it is the first feature produced by Roger Corman. It was shot in only six days on an ultra-low budget, a formula Corman would use throughout his 70-year career.
An artist visiting a seaside Mexican village has her interest piqued by talk of a man-eating devil creature. Her handsome new friend is a marine biologist who doesn’t believe it, but she keeps digging around to satisfy her curiosity. She finally gets the cynical scientist on board after learning the sightings of the creature with one “big red eye” started at the same time as radiation experiments in the Bikini Atoll.
Since we’re on the topic of Corman and an octopus, I will take two sentences to plug one of the greatest octopus movies ever made even though it doesn’t fit into the “classic film” time frame. In 2010, Corman produced Sharktopus, a film with a title that tells you everything you need to know about the creature.
“Bride of the Monster”(1955)
Who doesn’t want a pet octopus to do their evil bidding? In this Ed Wood film, a scientist conducts experiments in an isolated house where an octopus comes in handy to get rid of any human “evidence.”
A nearby town lives in fear after 12 people (and counting) mysteriously disappear over three months which is blamed on the “Monster of Lake Marsh.” The police aren’t getting anywhere but feisty reporter Janet (played by Loretta King) will put herself in harm’s way to learn the truth and get her story.
Bela Lugosi plays Dr. Vornoff, a scientist who is a genius and a bit mad. That’s what happens when you experiment with atomic energy for 20 years to create super beings. He lives with his mute assistant Lobo (played by Tor Johnson), who he mistreats, and the pet octopus in a laboratory tank that is somehow connected to the lake. Bonus points for quicksand and crocodiles.
Lugosi’s character often talks to the octopus through a tiny window, but they are never in the same space together. The mechanical octopus was previously used in the John Wayne film Wake of the Red Witch.
Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea(1961)
This not only has a squid and octopus, but it’s also a full-on disaster film from the master of the genre, Irwin Allen. And it has an all-star cast including Walter Pidgeon, Joan Fontaine, Barbara Eden, Michael Ansara, Robert Sterling and Frankie Avalon (who also sings the title song). What more could you want?
The world is on fire after a meteor shower penetrates the Van Allen radiation belt (this is a real thing), sending temperatures soaring past 135 degrees and climbing daily. Cities are destroyed, governments collapse and the only one with a plan beyond “waiting it out” is Admiral Nelson (Walter Pidgeon) whose brilliance is considered by some to be on the edge of madness. (His detractors have nicknamed the Seaview, the new nuclear submarine he designed, Nelson’s Folly as they wait for it to fail.)
Nelson defies orders and takes the Seaview and its crew on a grueling voyage around the world to launch a nuclear missile into the belt. Danger is everywhere with the fire above the water, sabotage and possibly mutiny inside the Seaview, and killer creatures in the sea. There are two fantastic attacks from the cephalopod family: An oversized squid assaults crew members outside the Seaview and later a giant octopus wraps itself around the submarine with its tentacles stuck on the windows.
The film’s success led to the ABC television series (1964-68) that included an episode based off the film’s plot called The Sky’s on Fire, one of the lines in the film.
Tentacles (1977)
This Italian-U.S. collaboration has a solid cast going for it including John Huston, Shelley Winters, Henry Fonda, Claude Akins and Bo Hopkins, but suffers from frequent comparisons to Jaws. I think that’s a bit overblown since if you are making a movie with a sea creature, there are built-in similarities. Still give Tentacles props for the bold move in the opening scene of the first victim (no spoiler here).
Bodies are found in a seaside resort town sucked of everything but their bones. (Gross.) Investigations lead to more questions than answers as the body count rises. A reporter (Huston, who is a startling site in this caftan-like pajamas) asks a lot of questions and wonders if the construction of a new underwater tunnel has a role in what is happening. I love the moment when it is proclaimed that there is a “giant octopus” and the tone of the film changes. A marine expert and killer whale trainer (Bo Hopkins) will help track the octopus with help from his aquatic friends.
The threat of the octopus is persistent through the film. Early attacks are quick and off screen; other times there’s a quick look at a large tentacle or a massive eye to give the scale of the creature. As the film progresses, the attacks become more intense with a few well-done scenes in terms of scope and terror including a harrowing attack on a boat race with children. The take down of vessels is done with the unexpected gracefulness of a dancer as its “legs” engulf the boats.
– Toni Ruberto for Classic Movie Hub
You can read all of Toni’s Monsters and Matinees articles here.
Toni Ruberto, born and raised in Buffalo, N.Y., is an editor and writer at The Buffalo News. She shares her love for classic movies in her blog, Watching Forever and is a member and board chair of the Classic Movie Blog Association. Toni was the president of the former Buffalo chapter of TCM Backlot and led the offshoot group, Buffalo Classic Movie Buffs. She is proud to have put Buffalo and its glorious old movie palaces in the spotlight as the inaugural winner of the TCM in Your Hometown contest. You can find Toni on Twitter at @toniruberto or on Bluesky at @watchingforever.bsky.social
