Deep Rising is a 1998 American action horror film written and directed by Stephen Sommers and starring Treat Williams, Famke Janssen and Anthony Heald.

[3][4] Amidst a storm, Captain John Finnegan and his crew, Joey Pantucci, and Leila are hired by mercenaries Hanover, Mulligan, Mason, Billy, T-Ray, Mamooli, and Vivo to pilot their boat across the South China Sea to an undisclosed rendezvous point.

Something rises from beneath and rams the vessel, leaving it dead in the water, as the passengers are slaughtered by unseen monstrous creatures.

The mercenaries seize control with the intention of looting the passengers and vault of the Argonautica and then using the torpedoes stored on board to sink the ship.

Canton theorizes that the creatures are an evolution of the Ottoia, which drain their victims of their bodily fluids and then eject the bloody carcasses.

Trillian returns to the Argonautica and locates a jet ski with the fuel they can use to reach the island, but Canton arrives armed with a flare gun.

The Octalus grabs hold of Finnegan, who shoots it in the eye, blinding it and freeing himself, and he and Trillian escape on the jet ski.

Stephen Sommers began writing the script to Deep Rising, then called Tentacle, when he worked at Hollywood Pictures in the mid-1990s.

The exterior shots of the cruise ship Argonautica were created by computer-generated imagery; it is an original design not based on any existing vessel.

The website's "Critics Consensus" for the film reads, "Its fleeting glimpses of creature feature mayhem are certainly dumb fun, but Deep Rising cribs from far too many better movies to stand on its own.

[12] Variety's Leonard Klady said the film "is an old-fashioned B-movie with A-budget effects, but the quality sheen can't disguise the cheap-thrills hokum.

"[13] Ty Burr, writing for Entertainment Weekly called the film "a tightly written, often howlingly funny Aliens knockoff that, in its portrayal of tough men and tougher women under pressure, favorably recalls the work of Howard Hawks", giving it a grade of "B−".

[14] Bloody Disgusting wrote, "Excellent cast, State-of-art special effects, and terrific acting, this is a movie that should not be missed.