The Deep
An obvious attempt to cash in on the success ofJaws, this 1977 thriller was also based on a bestseller by Peter Benchley, and it features a memorable performance by Robert Shaw (the doomed shark hunter inJaws) in one of the last roles of his career. Looking very tanned and healthy, Nick Nolte and Jacqueline Bisset play a young couple enjoying a tropical vacation who discover a glass ampoule while scuba diving off the coast of Bermuda. It takes a seasoned treasure hunter (Shaw) to identify the ampoule as part of a valuable shipment of World War II morphine lost at sea, coincidentally, atop the even greater treasure of a sunken Spanish galleon. Thus begins a race for drugs and treasure pitting Nolte, Bisset, and Shaw against a ruthless drug lord (Louis Gossett Jr.) who'll do anything--even resort to Haitian voodoo--to get what he wants. It's all rather contrived and exploitative (after all, the movie's best known for Bisset's wet T-shirt scuba-dive), but as escapist entertainment goes it's got some exciting highlights including a moray eel that attacks on cue and... well, uh, Jacqueline Bisset in a wet T-shirt.--Jeff Shannon