Leviathan - Film Review

Earlier this week, I was recommended Peter Weller's Screamers, however I saw this in the recommended section and just can't say "no" to an Alien knockoff. I suppose that after Outland (see my review here) I was overly optimistic and ended up not getting exactly what I wanted. 

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Where You Can Find It: I saw this on Amazon Video where it is available for rent/purchase.

General Information 
Leviathan is a science fiction horror film that was released on 17 March 1989. It was directed by George Cosmatos and produced by Italian film company, Filmauro, with Metro-Goldwyn Mayer distributing in America. Like Outland, Academy Award winner, Jerry Goldsmith, supplied his signature minimalistic score to this. Although the overall budget for Leviathan is unclear, it brought in approximately $15 million with a poor reception that generally described it as "cliché-filled." It has a blissfully mediocre 51 Metascore on Metacritic, however it has an atrocious 24% Tomatometer rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

The Story
Dr. Steve Beck (played by Peter Weller) is a geologist in charge of an underwater mining station that belongs to the international corporation, Tri-Oceanic Corp, which is nearing the end of a stressful three-month deployment. Near the final days their rotation, Beck's crewmates, Six-Pack (Daniel Stern) and Willie (Amanda Pays) discover a sunken Soviet Union submarine named "Leviathan." The crew pulls aboard a cache of items and files that reveal the Leviathan's crew died under mysterious circumstances, and it doesn't take long before the mining station starts to exhibit similar problems akin to the old Soviet submersible. Beck and the rest of the group will not only have to contend with the Leviathan's secret lurking their station's halls, but also the unfeeling Tri-Oceanic Corp., represented by its CEO, Ms. Martin (Meg Foster).

Although it's well-established this film rips off the story of Alien, I'd also say that it generally takes a great deal of inspiration from John Carpenter's The Thing. I appreciated the body horror elements in this story, as well as the mystery surrounding the secret of the Leviathan's crew's demise. Unfortunately, the mystery has very little pay-off, while a good chunk of the overall tension is wrecked by a lack of good characters.

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Beck's crew aren't exactly the brightest bulbs in the bunch

One of the gravest flaws of this film's plot is that its characters are just not all that interesting. With the small exception of Willie, everyone else is incredibly unlikable. Six-Pack is a walking sexual harassment lawsuit; Doc Thompson (Richard Crenna) makes incredibly weird decisions when he can be bothered to actually do his job; and even Beck seems fairly bland and unmotivated. The decisions the characters make at times are equally baffling as one of them seemingly embraces death for no reason other than that the plot demanded it. Alien and The Thing succeed where this fails as their characters took initiative and made logical decisions once things got scary, whereas Leviathan's cast merely react and poorly at that even.

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I'd feel more sorry for Doc if it weren't for the fact that he put himself into this predicament...

Special Effects/Atmosphere
The Tri-Oceanic Corp. mining station looks awesome and I was really impressed with some of the background set-design as we see clear pipes and clunky computers working in the background. The underwater scenes are also really cool, and I have to admit that the opening scene where DeJesus (Michael Carmine) suffers a problem with his suit was a pretty awesome way to establish the danger of working underwater. I'm not sure how some of the scenes were filmed via the underwater exterior of the mining station, but it was a really nice touch and it deserves recognition as well.

Without getting into spoilers, the creature design was pretty good as the use of practical effects and selective camera-use helped make the antagonist look menacing. Unfortunately, the later shots of the creature don't hold up well today, with some of the final shots looking a bit goofy. One thing that does set this movie apart from its predecessors is its implementation of special effects in water as I imagine that adds a whole new layer of difficulty while filming.

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Some of the practical special effects are quite good

The Acting
Although he's not a particularly amazing actor, I generally like Peter Weller. Despite that, I found his performance to be arguably the worst out of everyone. Weller comes off as flat and uninterested throughout most of this, while his chemistry with all but Richard Crenna is quite dull. Considering Beck is supposed to be the leader of the mining team, he certainly doesn't seem like it.

I enjoyed Ernie Hudson's performance as Jones for what it was as he seemed excited to be in this, but it doesn't save this film. The same could be said for Michael Carmine and Hector Elizondo (who plays Cobb). Overall, I'd say they deliver their lines satisfactorily, but nothing stands out as great or even good, just serviceable.

The Best of the Best: Six-Pack finding an aquatic spider in his bed.

The Worst of the Worst: Doc's behavior in this film makes the extras from all of the Friday the 13th films (even Shelly) look like geniuses.

Calhooey Score: 4/10 - Below Average

Would I Recommend?
5
Back to the depths with you!

Leviathan is a serviceable reproduction of Alien and The Thing, but lacks any of its predecessors' soul. The acting is lame to serviceable while the special effects no longer hold up. If you like science fiction horror, I suppose I would recommend this as a rental, but even that might be too much. If this ever becomes free to Amazon Prime members, I might suggest it then. As it stands, there are better movies of this genre out there. I recommend 2020's Underwater or Deep Blue Sea if you're looking for aquatic horror, or Outland if you want something like Alien but still unique in its own way.
Spoiler Comments
  • Despite suffering suit malfunctions and having an incredibly limited oxygen supply, Six-Pack decides to explore the nearby submarine and play hide-and-seek with Willie.
  • What if the spider in Six-Pack's bed wasn't actually placed there by Willie but instead by Kevin McCallister who has somehow found a way to transcend the limitations of the Home Alone franchise so that he can continue to antagonize Daniel Stern?
    • I miss Joe Pesci...
  • One of my friends had an awesome theory that Doc was secretly one of the Russian scientists involved with the research that went on at the Leviathan, which was why he acted so shady.
    • Too bad. He was just being idealistic/stupid I guess.
    • Seriously... He's supposedly the smartest dude on the station and he literally grabs Cobb as he's transforming into a monster.
  • Apparently, George Cosmatos has never heard of the bends...
  • Aw man, Jones thought he was going to survive to the end but then realized he was a black man in a Twentieth Century horror film. Only LL Cool J gets that honor, I guess...
  • Somebody needs to make a gif of Peter Weller punching out Meg Foster. I'm not sure why, but that scene is hilarious.
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Never mind, found it. Thanks, internet!

 References
(1) Wikipedia. (n.d.). Leviathan film image. Retrieved from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leviathan_(1989_film).
(2) CoolHandRK. (2015, September 1). Daniel Stern staring image. Imgur. Retrieved from: https://imgur.com/gallery/jMHha.
(3) Leviathan - 1989 Movie. (2019, July 25). Doc dying image. Facebook. Retrieved from: https://www.facebook.com/pg/leviathan1989fanpage/posts/.
(4) Gifs. (n.d.). Leviathan monster gif. Gifs.com. Retrieved from: https://gifs.com/gif/leviathan-1989-don-t-f-with-mother-nature-scene-5-11-movieclips-g5Amqj.
(5) Dee, J. (2017, January 5). Peter Weller shouting image. JoBlo. Retrieved from: https://www.joblo.com/horror-movies/news/the-fckin-black-sheep-leviathan-1989-302.
(6) Dan Thunder. (2020). Peter Weller punching Meg Foster gif. ResetEra. Retrieved from: https://www.resetera.com/threads/finally-watching-leviathan-1989-have-you-all-seen-this.173198/.

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