Tell me, O Octopus, I begs/ Is those things arms, or is they legs? /I marvel at thee, Octopus/ If I were thou, I'd call me Us. -- Ogden Nash, "The Octopus"
For World Octopus Day (October 8) a look at some of our favorite cinematic cephalopods. Nota Bene: the plural is "octopuses" not "octopi". The latter works on the assumption that the word uses the Latin noun ending "us", which is "i" in the plural. But it's a Latinization of a Greek neologism combing οκτώ (eight) and ποῦς (feet). The ending is "pus", not "us", so it's "puses". Knowledge to destroy your friends with. Release the Kraken!
Cephalopods, like many other creatures of the animal kingdom, get a bad rap in popular culture. They are among the most alien of species to humans, way, way apart from us in the evolutionary tree, with countless bizarre features that fascinate most of us, and frighten the ignorant. To top it off, they turn out to be smart...perhaps too smart.
Anyway, here are some favorite productions that feature the much maligned sea beasts and their relatives. It's not an exhaustive survey. In the spirit of "octo" we restrict ourselves to eight entries.
Sh! The Octopus (1937)
This wacky comedy/mystery starring Hugh Herbert and Allen Jenkins is a kind of parody on such mysteries as The Bat and The Gorilla, in which the heroes investigate a CRIMINAL who names himself after a scary creature, but the telling maintains ambiguity, with strong implication that it's some version of the creature itself as well. This one takes place in an old lighthouse. Believe or not, it's based on a stage play from a decade earlier. It's famous for its reveal at the end.
Bride of the Monster (1955)
It's now an immortal moment of -antic classic cinema history, how in Bride of the Monster, schlock auteur Ed Wood alternated stock nature footage of a real octopus, with his actors thrashing around with the inert tentacles of a rubber giant octopus prop in the dark. The moment in immortalized in the film Ed Wood (1994). More on the film here.
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1954) et al
Of course it's a giant squid not an octopus in the Disney adventure classic, but for many years as a benchmark of tentacled terror. Similar films featuring eight-armed beasts based on Jules Verne and similar vintage sci fi include Mysterious Island (1961) and The Lost Continent (1968). More here.
It Came from Beneath the Sea (1955)
A relic from the age of giant radioactive monster movies, with stop motion tentacles animated by Ray Harryhausen. More on the film and others like it here.
Don't Give Up the Ship (1959)
Jerry Lewis encounters an octopus while undersea diving in this Navy comedy. This is case where my wife, a cephalopod lover and Jerry Lewis hater, would definitely root for the aquatic predator.
Tentacles (1977)
This preposterous Jaws rip-off, a Italian-U.S. co-production, has become a personal favorite. More on it here.
The Beast (1996)
Speaking of Jaws, author Peter Benchley ripped himSELF off in The Beast, yet another slander upon the good name of eight legged mollusks. This one was released as a two part-part TV movie by NBC with William Petersen and Charles Martin Smith.
Your author is attacked by the creature in question in Alexis Sottile's play Small Dinner at the Brick Theatre, Williamsburg in 2017, while Jorge Morales doesn't look on.
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