THE AMAZING CAPTAIN NEMO (1978)
aka The Return of Captain Nemo
TV-Movie
Article 3428 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing Date: 11-23-2010
Posting Date: 1-2-2011
Directed by Alex March and Paul Stader
Featuring Jose Ferrer, Burgess Meredith, Mel Ferrer
Country: USA
What it is: Underwater Sci-Fi, Irwin Allen style

Captain Nemo is revived from suspended animation, and with the aid of his submarine, the Nautilus, he helps the U.S. government to do battle with an evil super-genius named Professor Cunningham and his submarine, the Raven.

I ran into some contradictory descriptions of what this movie actually was, but it looks like it was designed as a three episode pilot for a prospective series that was then edited into a movie, and that’s pretty much how it feels and looks. I didn’t see Irwin Allen’s name on the credits, but I certainly wasn’t surprised to discover he was executive producer; between the silly melodramatics and the eye candy, he’s got his fingerprints all over it. I’ve never seen a movie before that had both Jose Ferrer and Mel Ferrer together, and I was quite surprised to discover that they were not related; nevertheless, I had a little fun watching the two actors pair off in a duel. The most interesting performance is from Burgess Meredith, who vacillates between intriguingly offbeat (his supervillain chews on his glasses and is far more rumpled than any self-respecting supervillain should be) and scenery-chewing melodramatics (especially when his dialogue calls for it). He even references one of his episodes from “The Twilight Zone” at one point. Overall, it’s fun if rather stupid, but as a TV series, it would have gotten old very quickly. IMDB credits 8 writers, including the obvious Jules Verne and the surprising Robert Bloch.