And this one seems to know just when to attack so that nobody knows it's out there. Just like all its relatives seem to.

A lot of influence from Jaws (a nice way to say they ripped off some plot devices from it), but there is a well developed story here. The plot centers not to so much on the creature itself, but the lives (and of course some deaths) of those who have encountered it. Witnesses to its existence are treated like an outcast nut cases, while fishing revenues drop mysteriously and steadily, and mutilated bodies wash up on beaches all over. A few characters are given more dimension than to be just screaming victims, but there is a tad too much talking. It's done to give exposition on the characters and the creature they're up against, but there were probably some better ways to do this.

The movie lets the monster remain an unseen foe until near the end, which succeeds at making it more threatening. The monster appears hokey when you do finally see it, although the acting of the people in a life-or-death struggle with the creature is convincing enough to offset this.

Overall, decent enough for rainy Saturday afternoon entertainment.

If you accept the fact that this is a B-movie from the outset, this isn't too bad of a movie. The writing wasn't too badly stilted anywhere, the story is...well...a fairly predictable "sea monster" story, and the acting, while nothing to write home about, was certainly nothing to complain about. Of course, James van der Beek makes the movie a little easier to watch too. :)

My biggest complaint about the movie, other than the obvious low-budget quality, was the straight-forwardness of it. Establish the town, figure out the relationships, show monster to viewers, nobody believes monster exists, prove monster exists, deal with it, male and female leads fall in love and live happily ever after. Wow, now there's a story that hasn't been told about a million times before!

But in spite of its shortcomings, it was suitably entertaining for a Saturday afternoon where I had nothing better to do. I don't think I'd ever watch it again, but I'm not disappointed at having watched it a first time.

Having said that, it was nice to see a movie that recognised its own limitations and didn't pad out every scene with awful CGI.

Don't get me wrong....there is awful CGI at the end, but it brought a warm fuzzy glow to my heart to see them attempting to use more traditional methods to display the monster, or rather, its tentacles.

Of course, seeing someone wrap themselves up in a rubber tentacle is never going to be realistic, bringing back memories of old Tarzan movie "crocodile moments", but at least it was different.

Because of the lack of effects budget, there was actually some story to this flick. Not terribly involved, but enough that it could comfortably thumb its nose at SciFi Channel movies like Pterodactyl and the like. In fact the monster, as in the B-Movies of yore, makes relatively few appearances until the climax.

It is rather predictable and somewhat chortle-inducing. But at least it has the grace to not pretend to be anything other than what it is....a modern B-Movie.

SUMMARY: Rubber tentacles notwithstanding, this isn't the worst movie I've ever seen.