Death Ship

Death Ship is a 1980 horror film directed by Alvin Rakoff and starring Richard Crenna, George Kennedy, Nick Mancuso, Sally Ann Howes, Kate Reid, Victoria Burgoyne, and Saul Rubinek in an early role. The screenplay by John Robins was based on a story by Jack Hill and David P. Lewis. A British-Canadian co-production, the film was shot on-location in Dauphin Island, Alabama; Quebec City, Quebec; and the Gulf of Mexico. It was director Rakoff's only horror film, and upon release received mixed-to-negative reviews, but is considered a cult classic. Plot Prickly Captain Ashland is leading his cruise ship on his final voyage, attended by his replacement Trevor Marshall, who has brought along his family. In the middle of the night following a routine Caribbean route, their radar detects a mysterious black freighter on a collision course that matches their heading regardless of evasive maneuvers. Despite Ashland's best efforts, the boats collide, sinking the cruise ship and taking with it most of her crew and passengers. The next day, a handful of survivors — Marshall, his wife Margaret, their children Robin and Ben, a young officer named Nick and his love interest Lori, the ship's comic Jackie, and a passenger, Mrs. Morgan — are adrift on a large piece of wreckage. Ashland surfaces nearby and he is brought aboard, barely conscious. Later, the survivors come upon the black freighter, unaware it is the ship that attacked them. Finding a boarding ladder slung from the stern, they climb aboard, but not before the ladder plunges into the sea as the officers try to climb it with the injured Ashland. When all are finally aboard, Jackie tries to rally the survivors with humor, but a cable seizes him by the ankle, and he is swung outboard by one of the ship's cranes, which lowers him into the water before cutting him loose, to be swept astern and lost.