Anoraks Assemble

Tentacles is a 1977 horror / thriller / utter embarrassment, directed by Ovidio Gabriel Assonitis.

In yet another Jaws rip-off, residents of a U.S. coastal town are disappearing in strange circumstances. Enter reporter Ned Turner, played by John Huston (I mean, come on, John Huston, what was he thinking?)

We soon discover that the good townsfolk are being picked off by a giant octopus (I mean, obviously) and it is up to Bo Hopkins’ mean and moody hero Will to save the day. (I am not entirely sure how Will comes to the conclusion it is a giant octopus. Hopkins has a terrible habit of not opening his mouth to speak, so I might have missed the explanation).

Anyway, chuck in Shelley Winters, Henry Fonda, some awful dubbing and a really bizarre soundtrack, and the scene is set for 90 minutes of unintentionally hilarious shenanigans.

To be fair, there is quite a neat scene at the start when a mother leaves her child in its buggy at the waterside to go and talk to her friend. (Let’s ignore the fact that she left her kid alone). We see the buggy in the background with traffic passing along the road in front of it, obscuring our view. And then a bus passes by and suddenly the buggy is gone. It is a clever little moment, still kind of shocking even though we are expecting it. But sadly, this is as good as the film gets. There are a couple of quite hilarious moments, especially when the octopus causes absolutely carnage at a children’s boat race.

Honestly, this is typical 1970s TV move fare and it’s awful. It has a funky soundtrack which is so out of place, especially during the moments when people are being killed by the beast.

Acting wise, John Huston and Henry Fonda are fine, but they must have been paid an awful lot to do this. Shelley Winters (over)acts her little socks off, and Bo Hopkins is suitably heroic as Will, even though he irritated me so much by not speaking clearly.

Once seen, never forgotten!