Undersea Girl (1957) Poster

(1957)

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3/10
Soggy Drive-In Double Biller
Henchman_Number14 April 2020
Ace reporter Valerie Hudson (Mara Corday) and her friends discover a submerged body while scuba diving off the California Coast. When U.S. Bills are found on the victim that match the serial numbers of those that supposedly went down on a sunken ship, Hefty police Lt. Mike Travis (Dan Seymour) jumps on the case. When the Navy catches wind of the situation they bring in their own man, Lt. Brad Chase (Pat Conway), who as it happens is Hudson's ex-boyfriend. When our trio traces the bills back to the crew of a tuna fishing vessel the scene is set for a sub-aquatic crime-fest.

Though the movie has sort a of a cool period piece vibe it fails to create much energy. Despite the title Corday doesn't spend a lot of time under the sea. Beyond finding the aforementioned body and another junket where she finds herself in peril during the obligatory shark encounter, she rides out the movie on dry ground. The forced injection of a battle-of-the sexes match-up between Corday as the tough woman reporter demanding respect and Conway as the glib Navy lieutenant wears thin quickly and doesn't provide much lift. The movie hints at different sub-plots and situations which ultimately stall out. Superfluous lounge singing number launched midway through the movie adds little more than time killing filler.

Undersea Girl has no pretense about what it is, a low budget B double biller. Even so Nacirema Productions doesn't come close to clearing the bar that they set for themselves with their previous film, the similarly named Hot Rod Girl. Instead this looks like an attempt to springboard off the relative success of that film. While certainly no masterpiece, Hot Rod Girl had a sense of fun about it which is absent here. Other than the location shots and some okay underwater photography there isn't much to recommend.
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3/10
A film worthy of Davy Jones' locker.
mark.waltz20 June 2023
Warning: Spoilers
A very bland crime drama screams for color with the dull photography resulting from the poor black and white camera work. When you're underwater filming women swimming around in tight bathing suits and showing sea animals, showing these dangerous creatures in color would definitely be a more pleasing result. Mara Corday, who had a respectable career in B movies, plays a journalist researching the story of a sunken ship and missing treasure, certain that there's something going on that no one will tell her. She's upset that her boyfriend, navy lieutenant Pat Conway, won't help her with information he has on the case, claiming it's because she's a woman, when really it's because he doesn't want the criminals to know that they are closing in on them.

The heavys in the film are your typical one dimensional crooks, led by Ralph Clanton and the calculating Florence Marly who is seen looking off in a plotting daze, her grin showing the wheels turning as she does everything but rub her hands together in maniacal glee. Dan Seymour is the stereotypical dumb police lieutenant, working along side Conway, but not really adding any sensible help to the case. Even at just over 70 minutes, this moves at a painfully slow pace, and even underwater chases with a spear gun doesn't add any excitement. A rainy day at the beach ends up being a more fun prospect than this.
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