Movie Review: Titanic 666

Titanic 666, a new offering from Asylum Studio and being broadcast on Tubi, is a movie that doesn’t take itself too seriously as it provides “B” movie horror fair meant to be taken as is.

I had the pleasure of sitting down with some of the cast and crew of the movie at Wondercon in order to talk about the film which will be released on the Tubi streaming service on April 15th.  The film is an indirect continuation of Cameron’s Titanic movie in the sense that some footage from that film is used in the beginning of the film, per the production team.  Glenn Campbell, FX Supervisor on the film, was especially surprised at this noting that his team took it as a special challenge to try and meet that level of FX as best they could.  Campbell also noted that a typical Asylum film has around 40 FX scenes that must be worked on while this one had over 400, all of which had to be done in less than 100 days.  The screener I was provided did not have all of the finished visual effects but what was done was impressive, especially considering that all of Asylum’s visual effects are done in house.  Most notably, the facial effects on various zombies and the glitch effects on certain ghosts had a polish and “new look” horror feel that was equal to many moderately budgeted horror feature films on the market today.

The plot of the film itself centers around the Titanic III.  Yes, you read that correctly the Titanic III.  Actress Annalynne McCord, who was a font of knowledge about all things Titanic, was able to inform us that there is actually a Titanic II in production now with tickets being sold for it’s maiden voyage.  Ponder that one but I digress.  The owners of the Titanic III, White Star who owned the original Titanic, decide to pack the Titanic III with cosplayers, social media influencers and the like in order to take a PR voyage to the site of the original Titanic disaster.  There, they pause for all of 30 seconds to pay their respects before launching into a gala party.  What could go wrong?  Suffice it to say, plenty could go wrong and it does.

McCord plays a vapid social media influencer who has a conscious threatening to get out.  Unfortunately for the character it never does.  McCord provided some hilarious information about her character, comparing it to other characters she has played to include her character on Schitt’s Creeck.  Ironically, there is some family drama (lighthearted) in her depiction of this character as it closely mirrors her sister who is in fact a social media influencer.  Joseph Gatt (Game of Thrones) plays the head of a security team detailed to guard artifacts from the original Titanic disaster.  Gatt’s character has one of the more interesting character arcs in the film as his motivations are revealed.  Gatt himself remarked that it was enjoyable to play this character knowing the characters underlying motivations and ultimate fate.

As I stated previously, this movie is classic “B” movie fare and both the producer and director of the film, Paul Bales and Nick Lyon respectively, acknowledge that.  The script was a constantly changing animal and the movie was shot in less than two weeks on site at the Queen Mary in Long Beach, a sister ship to the original Titanic.  However, Lyon cautions people not to dismiss the movie but instead to go in ready to be entertained and frightened.  Lyon has produced several other films of this nature and he’s very adept a producing a film that provides horror movie entertainment that can be enjoyed in one sitting.

All in all this film is exactly what you would expect it to be.  If you go in expecting The Conjuring or Dawn of The Dead you will be disappointed.  If you go in expecting Plan 9 From Outer Space you will be blown away.  This has the makings of an underground cult hilt that I would have watched on Elvira’s Move Macabre back in the day and that’s the beauty of it.  Not every movie has to be polished or even makes sense, sometimes nonsensical fun is the attraction and if you’re looking for that then I recommend this film to you.

Writing – 2.5 of 5 Stars
Effects – 4 of 5 Stars
Acting – 2.5 of 5 Stars
Cinematography – 2.5 of 5 Stars

Overall Score – 2.7 out of 5 Stars

Produced by Asylum Studios
Released by Tubi

Watch the trailer for Titanic 666 below: