Uchujin65 wrote:
I don't care what people say, I love Hammer's Lost Continent. It's very much what Sayonara Jupiter or Prophecies of Nostradamus was to Toho: a huge freakin' mess, but a gloriously fun one. It's such a strange yet aesthetically pleasing work  
Uchujin65,

Yes, yes, yes!  I really dig these movies which seem to emerge from the unlikeliest places--that's where the really loony, insane, INTERESTING stuff comes from.  (And it seems the makers of these things only get it right once, when they're not completely aware of what they're doing.)  These movies that need the resources of a decent budget and then get away from the suits, if you will, inspire this exhilirating "What the heck's gonna happen NEXT?" feeling as I watch them.  When I saw this as a kid and they start trecking across the muck, I was thinking 'So the balloons are holding them up?  Uh, okay...holy cow, look at that shipwreck!  I also thought of the monster in this when I saw RETURN OF THE JEDI's pit monster--this one was gruesome.

You gotta respect the moviemakers when something genuinely awe-inspiring (if only for a moment) appears in a movie made for the mainstream market.  (Heck, one of my favorite SF movies of the 80's is DUNE, and one of my favorite films of the 70's is HOLY MOUNTAIN.)

I believe you have the correct source material, as well.  I have yet to wade into (sorry) some of these 'haunted seas' books and stories that are a small sub-genre, but I must get to them someday.