Rod Stephens People used to put EFFORT into TV movies...back when they used to make them. This certainly can be boring at times, but the location has originality to it, and it puts the characters in an isolated spot in the world...the tone with this is set early and it helps give you that sense for the rest of the movie. The romantic subplot isn't too bad either, since Chad Everett is a pro's pro anyway. I like that meals they eat too....Chad Everett whips up those omelettes for himself and Jennifer Warren, and Rockne Tarkington makes that awesome plate of steak and other trimmings one night for the crew in that kitchen. Now that's good eatin!

merklekranz Along the lines of "The Thing", with a touch of "Alien", "The Intruder Within" is no more than a mediocre creature feature. The boredom of an isolated oil drilling rig crew is translated to the screen as mostly boredom for the audience. Over 19,000 feet down, the drill encounters an unknown life form that is fascinating to the on board scientist. Where have you seen that before? Pick any similar monster film. Interestingly there are only good looking women working on the rig, one of whom is date raped by the undersea intruder. The beast itself goes through an all too familiar metamorphosis from hand puppet to man in rubber suit. Overall the movie lacks tension, and is loaded with way too much meaningless dialog. - MERK

DigitalRevenantX7 CAUTION: Plot spoilers present.The crew of the Zortron 101, an oil rig stationed off the coast of Antarctica & working 'off the books' in order to find a secret stash of oil, discover some small rocks that come up when the drill hits a depth of 19,000 feet. The rocks are then revealed to be some sort of eggs, which have been underground for untold millennia. When a crew member touches one of the eggs, he goes crazy & commits suicide by jumping overboard. The eggs hatch, revealing eel-like creatures that attack a worker before being killed by the rest of the crew. The victim is then driven to rape a female crewmember who gives birth to a hideous humanoid creature that then proceeds to massacre the crew.The Intruder Within was a 1981 telepic that came hot on the heels of the classic ALIEN, indeed being one of the very first such knockoffs. The producers decided to set the film on an isolated oil rig off the Antarctic coast & make the monster a prehistoric creature.Being an early-1980s telepic, The Intruder Within clearly doesn't have the budget to seriously compete with Alien, but that doesn't stop the director, Peter Carter, & crew from trying. And they give it a game try. The oil rig setting is unusual but it manages to work better for the film's limited budget. The visual effects are clearly primitive – consisting of rubber puppets & the final creature being an actor in an unconvincing rubber suit (which is kept mostly in the dark to disguise its shortcomings).Where the film tends to work best is as an account of life on an oil rig. The depiction of the rig's day-to-day lifestyle is authentic & elevates the film to watchable status. But while the film's setting is sound enough, the biology of the vicious hominid is all over the map – it is never clear as to how the creature can exist from an egg to an eel-like creature with teeth that bites a male victim, the victim becoming obsessed & raping a woman who then gives birth to the hominid (it is also never clear how the eggs can survive for untold millennia without dying). This seems to be the result of sloppy writing from Ed Waters. The climax with the creature is also lacking in impact but within perameters for the budget.Present audiences might also notice that there is a distinct lack of gore or nudity on display here but that's because the film was made for television back in the early 1980s & was therefore subject to strict conditions. Which is the reason I won't mark the film down too low for not showing the goods.

FieCrier Unfortunately rather boring. I watched it on the Trans World Entertainment big box videotape. Given that that company is still around, I wonder why they haven't rereleased their titles on DVD? Lost the rights? The cover of the box features a close-up side view of the monster's head; it's a better, clearer view than is ever had in the movie. It's a fairly cool H.R. Giger-esquire Alien-type thing.A bunch of people are on an oil rig that is having problems. The drill brings up some stones and a lamprey-like/Alien chestburster-type creature that latches onto a man and ends up killing him. One of the crew sneaks away some of the stones, which are perhaps actually eggs. He experiments keeping them under heat and under cold.Another crew member pricks his finger on one of the stone/eggs, and goes slowly insane. Some of the eggs hatch, and some more people die.Most of the time, the tedium of being on an oil rig is conveyed. People talk about their steak dinners, or about omelets. Part of the trouble with the pacing of the movie may be due to its having been a TV movie, complete with fade-to-black scenes.There are a few women on board the rig. One of them gets attacked by one of the men who are going insane. She gets to become a mother the wrong way.Last scene of the movie is sort of puzzling. A boat leaves the rig, and there are people still on the rig. Did they decide to stay? Were they quarantined?