Death Ship
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | Death Ship |
| Original title | Death Ship |
| Country of production |
Great Britain Canada |
| original language | English |
| Publishing year | 1980 |
| length | 82 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 16 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Alvin Rakoff |
| script |
John Robins , Jack Hill , David P. Lewis |
| production |
Derek Gibson , Harold Greenberg |
| music | Ivor Slaney |
| camera | René Verzier |
| cut | Mike Campbell |
| occupation | |
| |
Death Ship is a horror film that was made in 1980 by British-Canadian co-production. The main roles are played by George Kennedy and Richard Crenna .
action
A black freighter glides through the night. He sets course for a nearby cruise ship, German commands are heard: “Everything on battle station! Enemy contact! ”The cruise ship is commanded by Captain Ashland, who is making his final cruise. On board is his successor, Captain Marshall, who is traveling with his family. The black freighter is on a collision course, the horn sounds. Ashland tries an evasive maneuver, but he cannot prevent the collision. The cruise ship is sinking.
A handful of survivors, including Captain Marshall and his family, officer Nick and passengers Lori and Sylvia, and ship entertainer Jackie, have saved themselves on a large part of the wreckage. Captain Ashland, floating unconscious in the water, is spotted and rescued. They drift towards a ship and go on board. It is the black freighter that caused the collision, which the survivors do not realize. While trying to cheer up the survivors, Jackie is thrown overboard by a swinging cable.
The remaining survivors examine the apparently abandoned ship. It's full of cobwebs, the furnishings look old. Hatches open as if by magic, lights go on and off. Nick is knocked out on deck by a box swinging on a crane. Ashland, still delirious, hears a voice telling him it is his new ship. The others put food in a cabin and take Ashland there. A gramophone and a film projector start playing by themselves. Sylvia stays behind and watches the movie and is strangled by the apparently possessed Ashland.
Ashland dons a German naval uniform and declares himself the captain of the ship. Marshall and Nick discover that the freighter was a prison ship of the German Navy. The spirits of the convicts and the crew are still on board. Both plan to escape from the ship, but the lifeboats sink into the water by themselves and drift away empty-handed. Lori wants to take a shower, but the shower water turns into blood. In a panic, she runs into Ashland, who throws her overboard. Nick attacks Ashland, but is killed by Ashland. Marshall can kill Ashland with a knife and stop the ship.
Marshall finds a life raft below deck and the frozen corpses of killed soldiers and sailors. The raft is deployed, Marshall's children Ben and Robin jump onto the raft. Marshall's wife Margaret is captured by the resurrected Ashland and locked in a chain box. Ashland knocks down Marshall, who regains consciousness and looks for his wife who has escaped from the box. With her he can save himself on the raft, which Ashland is now shooting at with a rifle.
The freighter changes course on its own in order to sink another ship. Ashland wants to prevent that and ram the life raft with the freighter. Ashland storms into the engine room and shoots the engine. But he gets caught in a drive wheel and is crushed to death. His death screams mix with the screams of his victims. The marshals are happy to have escaped and after a while they are picked up by a rescue helicopter.
The black freighter is pounding through the sea at full speed. Again a German voice sounds: “Enemy contact!” The freighter sets course for another cruise ship and sounds its horn.
background
- The film was released on March 7, 1980 in US theaters. In Canada it was only released on April 4, 1980. In Germany, it came into video distribution in January 1984. It was also broadcast on German television under the title Das Todesschiff .
- The film was indexed from 1986 to 2011. In September 2015, the film was finally re-examined by the FSK and received unabridged approval from the age of 16.
- The film shown on the freighter is the British musical Everything Is Rhythm from 1936.
- For Sally Ann Howes it was the last role in a movie.
Reviews
The lexicon of international films praised the film as “an effective horror film that exploits an unreal situation to play suspense with primal fears; in his basic attitude cold and cynical, with some blatant cruelty. "
The film magazine Cinema, however, found that this horror made you seasick. Jack Sommersby from the online portal “eFilmCritic” also had a negative view of the film. Nothing about the film worked, he wrote. Halfway through the film, the already shaky story stopped developing.
The TV Guide's critics found the film so silly it was funny again.
Web links
- Death Ship in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- Original movie poster
- Death Ship in the German dubbing file
Individual evidence
- ^ Certificate of Release for Death Ship . Voluntary self-regulation of the film industry , September 2015 (PDF; re-examination, formerly FSK 18, test number: 154361V).
- ^ Death Ship. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed March 2, 2017 .
- ↑ Critique of Cinema
- ↑ Jack Sommersby on eFilmCritic (Engl.)
- ↑ Critique of the TVGuide (Eng.)