Humanoids from the Deep (1980) US 1 Sheet Poster

If you’re going to follow the boss’s orders, and make a film where the monsters ’kill all the men and rape all the women’, then you might want to head off the inevitable critical backlash by hiring a woman to direct. Barbara Peeters had previously made Bury Me an Angel (1971), a gritty biker chick revenge movie that’s due a reappraisal.

Roger Corman (for it was he) was very happy with how she’d shot her male death sequences, but thought the rape scenes were too ’shadowy’ (they shot the film under the title Beneath the Darkness after all) and lacked the required exploitative zing – so he had his second unit director reshoot more explicit sequences, only some of which were used. This, plus the title change made several cast members very unhappy. Ann Turkel and Peeters asked for their names to be removed – Corman refused. Screens showing Humanoids were given a feminist red paint attack on its original release, but it was still a big hit for New World Pictures.

Aka: Monster / Terreur sur la ligne

Condition: VERY FINE - reverse folded

Cast: Doug McClure, Ann Turkel, Vic Morrow, Cindy Weintraub (next was The Prowler / Rosemary's Killer (1981) and then nothing), Rob Bottin (playing one of his own Humanoid makeup designs)