CITY BENEATH THE SEA (1953) ** I feel silly even wondering if this film was once considered freewheeling, or decadent, or entertaining, or what? The best part is definitely Anthony Quinn acting like he's having a really good time, and efforts towards detachment from a particularly disastrous type of female. So, freewheeling, kind of, pretty much. He looks like he could be devastating in the fight scene. Scary? Well, the voodoo bit makes you wonder where Scooby-Doo is when you really need him. When Quinn and Robert Ryan split up the result is half a working film with no redeeming qualities at all. The dubious morality of most of the principals has gone mainstream, which is too bad, not just for society in general, but for our appreciation of quasi-morality flicks in general. I guess it's not all that much of a loss, but a heavy price to pay for it anyway. Hilo Hattie is pretty funny, as are the "underwater" sets, though, again, it may have been considered a promising effort back in those days.
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