It Came from Beneath the Sea is a 1955 American science fiction monster horror film from Columbia Pictures, produced by Sam Katzman and Charles Schneer, directed by Robert Gordon, that stars Kenneth Tobey, Faith Domergue, and Donald Curtis.

The screenplay by George Worthing Yates was designed to showcase the stop motion animation special effects of Ray Harryhausen.

A monstrous giant octopus rampages along the west coast of North America after becoming too radioactive from nuclear testing in the South Pacific for it to be able to hunt its natural prey in the Mindanao Deep.

[3] A nuclear submarine on its shakedown cruise in the Pacific Ocean, captained by Commander Pete Mathews, comes into contact with a massive sonar return.

Marine biologists Professor Lesley Joyce and John Carter of Harvard University are called in; they identify the tissue as a small part of a gigantic octopus.

The local sheriff, Bill Nash, takes Mathews and Joyce to the attack site, where they find giant suction cup imprints in the beach sand.

Joyce demonstrates to reporters a special jet-propelled atomic torpedo, which they hope to fire at the giant, while driving it back to the open sea before detonating the weapon.

[7] To keep shooting costs low, director Robert Gordon shot inside an actual submarine, both above and under water, using handheld cameras.

For a scene that takes place on a stretch of Pacific coastline, Gordon and his crew dumped several truckloads of sand onto a sound stage at Columbia, which they backed with a rear projection screen.

During their scene together, Kenneth Tobey found himself sinking through the sand to the point of appearing shorter than Faith Domergue on camera, forcing him to dig himself out of the hole between every take.

A more extensive love scene had been written for the characters but was literally torn out of the shooting script by Sam Katzman, to keep principal photography from going over schedule.

[15] The four-issue comic book miniseries It Came from Beneath the Sea... Again (2007), released by TidalWave Productions as part of their Ray Harryhausen Signature Series, continued the story.