Very very predictable, including the post credit scene !!!

Good story, Not enough for a whole film

The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

I saw this movie before reading any reviews, and I thought it was very funny. I was very surprised to see the overwhelmingly negative reviews this film received from critics.

For a movie with Charlton Heston, it is unusual bad. The camera work is an imposition. Many of the "underwater" scenes (like the falling rocks) are actually made ashore and you can see that way to obvious. Special effects are cheap. The plot is unreliable. Whenever the "DSRV" connected to the submarine and they opened the hatch, there wasn't even one drop of water coming down. The story is unnecessarily stretched to the point it hurts. At least in the last half hour it gets a bit better. The overall acting sways between weak and average. It's the first movie I had to give a bad rating and it was a disappointment.I normally enjoy movies with Charlton Heston. In this one it was really hard to just sit about one and a half hours and watch it till the end. But you can't judge a movie when you haven't seen it all.My suggestion is: skip this one.

In my youth the USS Threasher submarine accident occurred off Nantucket. All aboard were killed presumably from an internal pipe failure which caused a loss of power. The Threasher fell backwards and sank beyond it's crush depth cracking like an egg and killing all on board. A disaster!The U.S. Navy brought in the Trieste, a bathyscaphe to find the sub. The "Trieste" took to find any wreckage finally taking some photos of the sail and the tail of the sub. the Navy learned from this disaster that they needed a small deep diving mini sub to help with future operations and rescues. Hence the "Alvin" and the "DSRV" were developed.http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/sh-usn/usnsh-t/ssn593.htm Many elements of that story plus the wrecks of the Submarines S-4 (rammed, surviving crew members suffocated) and the "Sqaulus" (open hatch, much of crew rescued) can be seen in this film. It is maybe what was once called a "service picture" but why you would want to join the Navy after seeing this is a little beyond me.This story is pure Hollywood disaster movie and presents a scenario that probably would not happen or if it did would have resulted in the immediate death of all on the submarine. However, this displays the theory of how modern deep sea rescues would take place and also (all these mini submarines were brand new at the time) displayed some of the technology that would later find the wreaks of the Titanic, the Bismark, the Aircraft Carrier Yorktown, and dozens of other ships.Charlton Heston is superb and at his peak in this saying those good old "Gee, I wish I could talk like that!" Navy dialog. Having renewed his career with "Planet of the Apes" and "Airport 75", he gives that classic action hero performance that got him paid the "big bucks" of the time. I guess this was his last real action role. I do remember him on the Dick Cavett show promoting this film which was a bit sad because it was a one week wonder, opening and closing around the country as he was doing the interview.Providing more than adequate acting support are Ronny Cox in one of his early roles as the Exec. So is Stacey "Mike Hammer" Keach, Ned "Squeal like a piggy!" Beatty, and David "Grasshopper" Carradine. It is also the late Christopher "Superman" Reeve's first film. There are also many African American actors as both officers and crewman, something that was still new to American movie audiences.The special effects are good enough although there are a couple of cheesy underwater scenes. Adding to the unreality the submarine manages to not have it's batteries damaged in the accident, something that would be impossible because the circuit breaker panels all ran thru the compartment that was flooded. In other words, everyone should have been in the dark without any CO2 air scrubbers, heat, or light. It was like camping out with electricity.Still this is a good piece of entertainment and really gets a discussion going when you have REAL submariners watching it with you. Fun aplenty under those circumstances. Maybe I would tell you how a certain Polaris sub straddled it's crush depth during practice. These things are like planes underwater and just like you can fly too low, you can dive too low! I can recommend this film. It is good entertainment. It is available on DVD and can be had new for less than $6.00.

This movie was great! The acting is outstanding. David Carridine was riveting. This was Charleton Heston's last major action movie. It has you on the edge of your seat until the very end. In particular, some unanticipated acts of altruism take your breath away. Stacey Keach plays a good part. The rest of the cast (all of whom are still alive today except for Christopher Reeve) are all very good. Do not pay any attention to the negative comments that others have left here. They simply do not make movies of this caliber very often, especially these days where everything is about sex and stupidity. This is a thinking man's movie, very realistic in a lot of respects and ahead of its time in others. I learned things and was entertained at the same time.

"Gray Lady Down", which bears very little resemblance to the novel it was based on, is a nice, entertaining action thriller that holds up well today in contrast to today's action films because it's cloaked with a realism and plausibility that today's filmmakers seem determined to avoid like the plague.