The picture borrows the basic storyline from Marooned (1969), though its perspective is entirely from the point of the view of the rescuers rather than the stranded. In the mid-Atlantic, a major earthquake rips an undersea laboratory with three divers/researchers from its moorings, sending it who knows where. When a conventional rescue submarine is unable to locate the missing sea lab, the mid-size Neptune, a high-tech rescue vehicle, along with its builder, Adrian Blake (Ben Gazzara), are dispatched. Eventually the science team's head diver, Don McKay (Ernest Borgnine), scientist Leah Jansen (Yvette Mimieux), and diver Bob Cousins (Donnelly Rhodes) join in on the search for survivors.

The picture has three distinct acts, all of which emulate other movies. The first third is somewhat patterned after Fox's hit the previous year, The Poseidon Adventure (which also featured Borgine). The opening titles, over ominously stormy seas, and Lalo Schifrin's title cue are similar to that film, as is the earthquake which creates a tidal wave sending the sea lab's crew tumbling into the abyss. After that, the film becomes a conventional sea rescue movie, done better a few years later in Grey Lady Down (1978). Finally (and rather inexplicably), the picture changes gears and becomes a Lost World movie of the sort popular in low-budget '50s sci-fi films (Unknown World, The Lost Continent, etc.).

Although the film generates some honest suspense - will they find the survivors, if they did survive, before their air runs out? - by opting to stick with the rescue team screenwriter Jack DeWitt (A Man Called Horse) quickly runs out of anything like reasonable dramatic conflict for the actors to work with. Pressed for something to do other than look out of the Neptune's portholes with worried expressions, DeWitt turns Blake into a disagreeable crybaby ready to pull the plug on the rescue time and time again, while Leah, her boyfriend one of the missing, becomes a reckless risk-taker. Mimieux is lost with no character to play, while Gazzara phones in his role, straining credibility even further by adopting the Southern drawl of a Kentucky Colonel straight off the plantation. Only Borgnine, great actor that he is, can do anything with the thin material. Despite the triteness of his part, he walks away unscathed and remains eminently watchable even when the picture gets dull - which is much of the time.

Another problem is the film's structure. The purpose of the sealab isn't even explained until the film is nearly half over - they're studying "what causes earthquakes plus the full ecology shtick," Borgnine says none-too-illuminatingly. The result of this is that prior to the big earthquake we see divers and scientists (including its leader, played by Walter Pidgeon) in the ship up top slaving away on a project the audience knows nothing about. Who are these people? What are they doing? Why should we care about them? The film opens with an underwater brawl that leads Borgnine's character to fire one of the divers, but the scene has nothing to do with anything. (These early underwater scenes are also confusing due to sloppy second unit matching: barrel-chested Borgnine is doubled underwater by singularly svelte diver who resembles the actor not at all.)

Problems aside, The Neptune Factor isn't too terrible if a little dull until near the end, when the rescuers unaccountably stumble upon a patch of ocean floor real estate teaming with super-sized tropical fish. Their craft is threatened by, among other things, a bus-sized lobster and what looks like a colossal goldfish. Beyond the fact that this sudden turn into fantasy exists solely to burn up more running time and provide a little suspense for the climax, and that nothing in the screenplay even hints at this Lost World before they wander into it, the special effects used to bring these creatures to life are quite awful.

Seemingly turning to Bert I. Gordon for inspiration, the filmmakers use macro-photography to make ordinary tropical fish, the kind found at your local pet shop, the size of Hummers. The effect is totally unconvincing, with the actors awestruck by magnified little fishes. There are almost no shots of the actors interacting with the would-be monster fish, and the few shots that optically attempt to put the actors in the middle of the action are actually worse than anything Bert I. Gordon ever did, if such an achievement is even imaginable.

Video & Audio

The Neptune Factor - An Undersea Odyssey is presented in a razor sharp 16:9 enhanced widescreen transfer. The picture looks just great, so much so that even the boring underwater footage is at least pretty to look at on big screen TVs. Filmed in (2.35:1) Panavision, the transfer isn't perhaps as wide as it might be; it doesn't seem any wider than about 2:1. The myriad audio options (see below) include the original mono and a faux Dolby Digital 2.0 stereo mix, as well as mono French and Spanish-language tracks, as well as English and Spanish subtitles. The English audio tracks required considerable amplification, but otherwise sounded okay.

Extra Features

For many, the The Neptune Factor big extra will be its contrastive isolated film scores, the first written mainly by Lalo Schifrin and used in the final cut, the other by William McCauley and cut from the picture. No explanation is offered as to why McCauley's perfectly good music wasn't used, unless Fox was looking for a more conventional disaster picture-type score which Schifrin provides. It's a shame Fox didn't invite someone like film score historian Jon Burlingame to write liner notes comparing the two works.

Also included are two trailers and a couple of TV spots. One of the trailers is 16:9 enhanced, the other is not. A behind-the-scenes featurette runs eight minutes and is the usual promo film, with some footage of the picture being shot, and a few comments by actors like Borgnine plugging the film. The DVD's Gallery section is unusually good, with an "interactive" option allowing viewers to "zoom-in" on pressbook articles and the like, while the production stills and publicity art material is well-chosen and 16:9 enhanced. (It reveals that The Neptune Factor in at least some situations played the bottom-half of a double-bill with Battle for the Planet of the Apes.

A two-page booklet largely reproduces presskit publicity material, with additional text written by some lackey with no apparent knowledge of film history or moviemaking. The unnamed writer refers to this essentially Canadian production as "unlike anything Hollywood had ever experienced," thinks Ernest Borgnine is a "comedian," and cites the 1999 remake of The Thomas Crown Affair as Gazzara's representative work. The box art text is similarly sloppy, listing this as a 1966 production (I guess they were using that Fantastic Voyage template) and failing to note that the disc is 16:9 enhanced.

Parting Thoughts

The Neptune Factor falls well short of its promise as "the most fantastic undersea odyssey ever filmed," but on a Saturday kiddie matinee level has just enough mild suspense and action so that genre fans might want to sit through it once, and Fox's DVD makes the whole package attractive. Recommended.

Film historian Stuart Galbraith IV's most recent essays appear in Criterion's new three-disc Seven Samurai DVD and BCI Eclipse's The Quiet Duel. His audio commentary for Invasion of Astro Monster is now available.