Jane (Marina Giulia Cavalli) and Lee (Robert Marius) work for Greenpeace. Their assignment is to document whatever is going on at the E-Chem plant. E-Chem bought a jungle island and is supposed to be decontaminating waste that is being shipped from other facilities. In reality they are dumping it into the island’s volcano. Security at the plant is tight so no one really knows what is going on. Greenpeace was notified by the island’s missionary that something suspicious is being done with the contaminated waste.
Jane and Lee sneak into the plant. Lee takes video of what is going on. When they are discovered, he hides the tape. Lee gets caught but Jane manages to escape. The plant is run by an evil bastard named Kovaks (Charles Napier). Kovaks has Lee tortured to find out what happened to the tape. He also sends three of his security guards to catch or kill Jane. Either will do.
While trying to elude the guards, Jane runs into Bob (Daniel Bosch). Bob is a snake hunter. He milks poisonous snakes and sells the venom to a pharmaceutical company that makes anti-venom serum. Jane talks Bob into helping her get back into the plant to try to rescue Lee and find the tape.
In the meantime, a UFO lands in the lake near the plant. The alien inside is attracted to the nuclear waste being dumped into the volcano. The monster tears apart the plant and contaminates anyone it doesn’t kill.
“Alien From the Deep” or “Alien of the Abyss” was released in 1989 and was directed by Antonio Margheriti. It is an Italian science fiction horror movie. It was largely filmed in the Philippines.
The music score is stock music, so don’t be surprised if some of it is familiar and the dubbing is a little iffy.
The alien is magnificent. It looks like a giant black robot with a big rubber claw. You don’t get to see much of it but there is a wonderful shot toward the end where it stands at least twenty feet tall. It’s a little reminiscent of Robosaurus from “Steel Justice” 1992. The alien doesn’t show up until almost an hour into the movie. The first half of the movie is more like an environment adventure story.
The other fun part of the film is when Jane and Bob, the snake hunter, escape through a cave full of snakes. The three men on their tails trying to hunt them down end up snake bait. When you add in some wonderful explosions and crazy death scenes it ends up being better than expected. It starts slow but ends wild.