Captain Nemo and the Underwater City (1969)
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Captain Nemo and the Underwater City (1969)



The story begins with a storm at sea; several passengers on a ship get swept into the ocean. They would surely drown (and the length of time that they're underneath the surface seems long enough for them to drown anyway) but for the sudden appearance of underwater divers, who rescue them. Among those rescued is a heroic-like senator (Connors). Brought aboard the famous craft The Nautilus, they meet Captain Nemo (Ryan), who is polite but dictatorial. Soon after, they reach Nemo's underwater city, which Nemo has dubbed Templemir (why that name? Dunno; maybe someone else here has the answer).

Most of the conflict in the story stems from the old & tired love triangle plot - Connors' senator falls for Paluzzi, who is being wooed by Nemo's 2nd-in-command. Also, inexplicably - as sometimes happens in these adventure tales, Nemo begins to favor new man Connors over his loyal 2nd-in-command. At least one of the rescued persons is also a troublemaker, very nervous about being stuck in paradise deep under the sea. And, a couple of others always seem to have sinister motives (Nemo is right to be cynical, I suppose). The whole thing is kind of a TV-movie-styled pale version of the big 1954 Disney film.
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I thought Ryan was miscast; Nemo, to me, is an eccentric, intense genius and the stern, gruff one-note Ryan just doesn't fit the part. He begins to fall for Newman's smart & pretty widow, also hard to buy into. I also didn't quite buy into Connors as a senator. The story also throws in a giant sea monster - dubbed Mobula (derived from a scientific term), it's a giant manta ray. It shows up briefly a couple of times. This was released, btw, in late 1969 in a couple of other countries, but not until 1970 in the USA.


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