DEEPSTAR SIX (1989) *1/2 A worthy idea, at least in formation: an old-school creature feature from the deep. The problem isn't that the creature doesn't rear its ugly three-jawed head until late in the picture, that's traditional. The problem isn't the shoestring plot, abominable dialogue, putrid and pedestrian representations of thespian ideals, or turgid tempo theme...those are hardly fatal in this genre. The problem is that none of the actors are interesting: neither competent nor laughable in the sense of Madame Jenkins; neither hideous nor attractive; not clothed in strange costumes; not culturally adrift like cowboys on Neptune; not sprouting perplexed appendages from strange places, and not even Romanian. There is a fair amount of blood and gore but it's so poorly presented that the effect of, a dismembered body flouncing along what appears to be a clothelines for example-is more mild amusement than anything resembling revulsion. What's left is to admire the juvenile underwater sets, and to make efforts at determining whether they're shot in a swimming pool, bath tub, or sink. May have been a swimming pool, I thought that I could make out a brick under some of the collapsing ocean floor.
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