Gripping story with well-crafted characters

Boring

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

Watching "Destination Innerspace" again after so many years, one instantly notices how low this film's budget must have been. Also upon re-inspection, a few new qualities emerge. Namely, the unintentional laughs. Previous reviews have already noted the outrageously tiny-looking miniatures, and how some of the music cues (borrowed from the B-classic "Angry Red Planet") are not exactly subtle. Oh, and the sight of Gary Merrill trying to subdue a big, walking large-mouthed bass is certainly hard not to find amusing now. Such sad but funny indicators of low budget film-making aside though, what does still seem to work about this little movie is the premise: a monster preying on humans trapped in a confined space, which is basically how "Alien" works. Only here, we have an underwater facility "subbing" for the space tug Nostromo and being stuck on the ocean floor is not a bad setting if you're making a claustrophobic thriller. One sequence to admire is the alien ship's arrival on the scene. Watching as it soars directly over the sea lab, with the addition of sound effects giving voice to it's engines the space craft actually becomes kind of impressive. It's rather neat the way it "buzzes" the installation with it's nervous crew watching from inside. Clearly, they had the right idea here, and with a little more money this could have been a first rate sci-fi thriller. One can also definitely defend the sequence where the crew attempt to lure the alien creature into a booby trap of spear guns. It's rather suspenseful as the hero, Commander Wayne, using himself as bait, bangs on a metal door and waits forcing the viewer to sit and wait there with him for the monster's inevitable appearance. Speaking of Commander Wayne, this guy emerges as quite an enjoyable hero, and playing him like John Wayne underwater, Scott Brady is so well cast in the role that he really elevates the occasionally soggy proceedings to a level it never would have achieved without his capable presence. His smart alec, tough guy lines are funny, too like when he tells a cynical female marine biologist, "You listen to me, beautiful. I grew up with a couple of sisters, and let me tell you something: a brother doesn't always tell a sister "everything". Shove that under your microscope and study it awhile." In fact, Commander Wayne has a snappy answer for just about everyone on board: Dopey scientist: "do you realize the importance of this, Commander?"Wayne: "I realize the danger we're in." Dopey scientist again: "We've been cut-off from topside. Something must have happened to their communication equipment." Wayne: "More likely something happened to them.It's not a great script, nor is it brilliantly directed, and there are sure lapses in the pace here and there. All quite true. Still, this ancient sci-fi flick does achieve a modest measure of suspense. With the addition of an appealing star, some very funny lines and some unintentionally funny fx's, well, you could do worse than introduce your child to this enjoyable little monster movie.

I rate this movie to be like..."The creature from the black lagoon" meets a bad episode of "Sea Hunt", meets "Mars needs women". But....you have to remember the 60's didn't have computer graphics special effects. And you must remember this was a low budget movie. It is ok to watch for a laugh if you watch it in the spirit of the times in which it was made. I like this movie particularly because I have acquired and own the twelve foot long, red, torpedo shaped, twin open cockpits, wet submarine that was used in this movie. It's neat to own a piece of the original equipment from this movie.

This isn't a B-flick. It's worse, it's a C-flick. Sea-flick? See?Now that my really bad joke is out of the way, I can say this movie is one really bad joke on the audience. To say that the science is flawed is an understatement. (The specimens in the biology lab will die without air?!? They're a sealab; their purpose is to study water-breathing life!) The bombast-filled score is nothing more than stale leftovers from the 1950s, straining at almost every moment to add suspense where none exists. The sets are among the least convincing I've ever seen and the special effects are laughable. The "giant" spaceship and the sealab look like the 12-inch miniatures they probably were. The rubber-suited monster is not scary at all even when poor bluescreen matting makes it look several times larger that life. Worst of all, it commits the cardinal sin that distinguishes truly bad movies from the classics like "Plan 9 from Outer Space," it's no fun. It makes Irwin Allen's "Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea" series look like "Star Wars." Even the eminently forgettable "DeepStar Six" and "Leviathan" were an order of magnitude better than this. It's almost enough to make me rent "Sphere" and finally see the second half. Almost, but nothing's quite that bad.

I cry more often now that Mystery Science Theatre 3000 quit making new episodes, and rarely harder than this evening after viewing "Destination Inner Space." This film features a yellow (sometimes orange, depending on aquarium clarity) crucifix-shaped Sealab ("Aquasphere") reached via a yellow-painted soup can on a string and filled with abrasive oxygen-depleting humans being stalked by the Wisconsin state record bluegill. I would applaud the many silent hours of scuba diving, but Scott Brady looks exquisitely uncomfortable in his extremely snug wetsuit; also the lovely silence is often disturbed by loud outbreaks of soundtrack. I like actress Sheree North and was sorry that her character was pressured into falling for the pickup line "Shove that under your microscope and study it." This movie hurts quite a bit, yet amuses in that painful MST3K style, so I recommend it highly to cheese admirers who can drown it out with their own commentary. Grab a puppet and wipe those tears away!