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DVD The Abyss (Full-Screen Edition)
Meticulously crafted but also ponderous and predictable, James Cameron's 1989 deep-sea close-encounter epic reaffirms one of the oldest first principles of cinema: everything moves a lot more slowly underwater. Ed Harris and Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, as formerly married petroleum engineers who still have some "issues" to work out, are drafted to assist a gung-ho Navy SEAL (Michael Biehn) with a top-secret recovery operation: a nuclear sub has been ambushed and sunk, under mysterious circumstances, in some of the deepest waters on earth, and the petro-techies have the only submersible craft capable of diving down that far. Every image and every performance is painstakingly sharp and detailed (and the computerized water creatures are lovely) but the movie's lumbering pace is ultimately lethal. It's the audience that ends up feeling waterlogged. For a guy who likes guns as much as Cameron (his next film after all, was the body-count masterpiece Terminator 2: Judgment Day), it's interesting that the moral balance here is weighted heavily in favor of the can-do engineers; the military types are end-justifies-the-means amoralists, just like the weasely government bureaucrats in Aliens. --David Chute
You know how DVDs claim to have special features, and the special features end up being chapter selections and the original trailers - and that's it? Well, The Abyss Special Edition is a model for what special editions should be. When the movie was originally released, the studio thought it was too long and wanted it cut. So Cameron cut a whole subplot of the movie, but it turns out to be the most important subplot. So the disc not only includes the original theatrical release, but the directors cut, which lengthens the movie to almost three hours, but fills in a lot of holes in the plot. The movie, in both versions, is an above average science fiction thriller. Cameron, for all his vision and movie-making skills, is still only an above-average writer. But the DVD includes scores of information that makes the technical achievement of the film very fascinating. There are two "making of" documentaries, one 10 minutes and one 60 minutes. There are storyboards, drawings, and pages of technical information on deep sea diving. Want to know more about if the liquid breathing apparatus used in the critical section of the film is science fiction or science fact? There is a ton of information on the history of experiments in liquid breathing and the possibilities for the future. There is even a copy of the 20 minute special effects video sent to Motion Picture Academy voters to vote on Oscars for the movie.
If you like science fiction movies, you will probably like The Abyss. If you also like to know how movies are made, you will love this DVD. Any studio that calls their disc a special edition without this level of production is guilty of false advertising. The only negative is there is no audio commentary by the director or cast included.
Cameron's *real* underwater epic
Take one James Cameron movie, about a technological disaster at sea that forms the backdrop for a gripping love story. Add another blockbuster, about a motley crew of oil drillers called on to save the world. Sprinkle in a classic late 1968 movie about an outer space adventure to meet intelligent life on the other side of the universe. Add some neat science, a little humanity, cutting edge special effects, and a whole lot of water. Mix briskly. Serve... "The Abyss".
Comparisons to "Titanic", "Armageddon", and "2001: A Space Odyssey" notwithstanding, this is a gripping movie. Some have called it overlong, slow, and boring. Not to my eyes. The action sequences are intense and suspenseful, tempered nicely by some highly charged emotional content.
Any problems Cameron later ran into on "Titanic", he managed to solve perfectly here. That film's clunky script is replaced here by a techno-jargon packed (what were you expecting from Cameron's writing? Poetry?) story filled with minimalist but rather effective dialogue. Sure, there are some groaners that pop up once in a while, but they are few and far enough in between to be easily overlooked. When the sense of drowning and claustrophobia is this tangible, you can let the filmmaker get away with some mistakes.
The motley crew is headed by Ed Harris and Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, who begin fighting like a recently divorced couple should, but slowly grow close again as the pressure of their circumstances closes in. They have great chemistry together in both aspects, and manage fine performances despite the rigorous on-set conditions (Harris, for on, has such ill memories of the shoot that he refuses to talk about the movie). The rest of the crew is like something out of a Jerry Bruckheimer film: familiar faces playing eccentric but two-dimensional characters (Todd Graff even looks like Bruckheimer regular Steve Buscemi). Only here, their humanity and professionalism shines through (although whoever thought of casting Chris Elliott should have realized what a distraction that would be). Michael Biehn, who plays the leader of the Navy SEALs team assigned to investigate the demise of a nuclear sub, gets to twitch and shake his way into underwater madness. And he does it quite well.
As for the aliens, well, even though their ultimate purpose is unclear in the story, I'm not sure it really matters. Please accept their ineffableness, and admire their beauty. The water effects (which Cameron later adapted to create "Terminator 2") are still breathtaking. Imagine the impact they must have had on an audience in 1989. And the ending, which has been attacked and attacked and attacked, is no less believable or authentic than any other sci-fi movie. It has a wondrous Atlantis-risen-from-the-depths quality to it, that shouldn't be interpreted intellectually. Rather it is a highly charged and effective visceral moment that should be enjoyed as such. Just like the rest of the movie.
What is this digipak version?
This digipak edition DVD does NOT have a 5.1 soundtrack. The picture remains letterboxed, not anamorphic, and it still carries the THX certification, though it is not marked so on the box. If you can, obtain the original Special Edition release in plastic case with black cover, it has the 5.1 soundtrack. If, like me, you are still waiting for the proper anamorphic release of The Abyss, this is NOT IT, it is simply an inferior repackaging.
In Independence Day, a scientist played by Jeff Goldblum once actually had a fistfight with a man (Bill Pullman) who is now president of the United States. That same president, late in the film, personally flies a jet fighter to deliver a payload of missiles against an attack by extraterrestrials. Independence Day is the kind of movie so giddy with its own outrageousness that one doesn't even blink at such howlers in the plot. Directed by Roland Emmerich, Independence Day is a pastiche of conventions from flying-saucer movies from the 1940s and 1950s, replete with icky monsters and bizarre coincidences that create convenient shortcuts in the story. (Such as the way the girlfriend of one of the film's heroes--played by Will Smith--just happens to run across the... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Bill Pullman - Jeff Goldblum - Will Smith Director(s): Roland Emmerich DVD Release Date: Released the 11 February 2003 Usually ships in 24 hours
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The opening and closing moments of Robert (Forrest Gump) Zemeckis's Contact astonish viewers with the sort of breathtaking conceptual imagery one hardly ever sees in movies these day--each is an expression of the heroine's lifelong quest (both spiritual and scientific) to explore the meaning of human existence through contact with extraterrestrial life. The movie begins by soaring far out into space, then returns dizzyingly to earth until all the stars in the heavens condense into the sparkle in one little girl's eye. It ends with that same girl as an adult (Jodie Foster)--her search having taken her to places beyond her imagination--turning her gaze inward and seeing the universe in a handful of sand. Contact traces the journey between those two visual epiphanies.... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Jodie Foster - Matthew McConaughey Director(s): Robert Zemeckis DVD Release Date: Released the 16 December 1997 Usually ships in 24 hours
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The latest testosterone-saturated blow-'em-up from producer Jerry Bruckheimer and director Michael Bay (The Rock, Bad Boys) continues Hollywood's millennium-fueled fascination with the destruction of our planet. There's no arguing that the successful duo understands what mainstream American audiences want in their blockbuster movies--loads of loud, eye-popping special effects, rapid- fire pacing, and patriotic flag waving. Bay's protagonists--the eight crude, lewd, oversexed (but lovable, of course) oil drillers summoned to save the world from a Texas-sized meteor hurling toward the earth--are not flawless heroes, but common men with whom all can relate. In this huge Western-in-space soap opera, they're American cowboys turned astronauts. Sci-fi buffs will appreciate Bay's... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Ben Affleck - Billy Bob Thornton - Liv Tyler - Bruce Willis DVD Release Date: Released the 05 January 1999 Usually ships in 24 hours
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After he pushed the envelope of computer-generated special effects in The Abyss, director James Cameron turned this hotly anticipated sequel to Terminator into a well-written, action-packed showcase for advanced special effects and for one of the most invincible villains ever imagined. Terminator 2: Judgment Day is a legitimate sequel: there's more story to tell about a hulking, leather-clad android (Arnold Schwarzenegger) who arrives from the future to protect a rebellious teenager and future leader (Edward Furlong) from being killed by the tenacious T-1000 robot (Robert Patrick), whose liquid-metal construction makes him seemingly unstoppable. The fate of the future lies in the balance, with Linda Hamilton (who would later marry her director) reprising her role as... More Info about this DVD Director(s): James Cameron DVD Release Date: Released the 03 June 2003 Usually ships in 24 hours
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This is the film that cemented Schwarzenegger's spot in the action-brawn firmament, and it was well deserved. He's chilling as the futuristic cyborg who kills without fear, without love, without mercy. James Cameron's story and direction are pared to the bone and all the more creepy. But don't overlook the contributions of Linda Hamilton, who more than holds her own as the Terminator's would-be victim, Sarah Connor--thus creating, along with Sigourney Weaver in Alien, a new generation of rugged, clear-thinking female action stars. It's surprising how well this film holds up, and how its minimalist, malevolent violence is actually way scarier than that of its far more expensive, more effects-laden sequel. --Anne HurleyMore Info about this DVD Director(s): James Cameron DVD Release Date: Released the 02 October 2001 Usually ships in 24 hours
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