The
Abyss is a 1989 fictional movie that I saw in a movie theater back in the summer of 1989. The
Abyss had an estimated budget of around $45 million dollars with box office sells of $90 million dollars. There is a massive amount of bonus features on the bonus disc for this 4K Blu-ray disc that was released on 3-12-2024. The BD-25 bonus disc has literally over 2,000+ still images of prototype scripts, other detailed reading material, and still images and videos. The amount of onscreen reading material can take a couple of days at least for the average human being (unless one is an AI machine that can read the material in less than a few minutes to a few hours). So, a lot of reading material that is around 1,500+ pages with maybe 500+ still photos and some videos. This was all legacy material from the 480i DVD ported over to the bonus BD-25 Blu-ray disc at MPEG-2 480i quality, and the videos in the legacy material being MPEG-2 with upscaled 1080i. The bonus Blu-ray disc also has new native 2K (1080P) MPEG-4/AVC material with James Cameron. There was a lot of stuff deleted from the original prototype beta script that I read, and in theory the
Abyss movie might have been at least 4 hours long if everything was included in some of the first original scripts, so James Cameron revised the movie script and took many things out of the script before finishing the script in late 1987 (Also the
Abyss script came first, then the movie second, and the
Abyss book was written after the movie was completed according to the extra features. Book released 6-1-1989 before movie on 8-9-1989, but movie was completed before the book and the book is based on the movie, and movie is based on the script). Filming for the
Abyss began on August 15th,1988. The original August 9th 1989
Abyss movie release was around 2 hours and 20 minutes and 16 seconds long. James Cameron personally approved of that shorter 1989 version of the movie since at the time historically shorter movies did better at the box office since theaters could show the movie at least a few times in a day. James Cameron’s studio contract gave him final approval regarding the movie, and therefore James decided to release the shorter version of the movie in 1989. However, James Cameron (who is also called Jim Cameron in the bonus material many times) decided to work on The
Abyss Special Edition that was released in theaters in 1993. The Special Edition of the
Abyss became the official final and finished version of the movie that was around 31 minutes longer at 2 hours 51 minutes and 1 second. This special edition has the famous wave scenes in it which turned the movie from an underwater E.T. style movie to a Day the Earth stood still style of movie. In April of 1993 the
Abyss Special Edition version was released on the Laserdisc format for the first time and also the first THX certified Laserdisc (over 25,000 copies sold on Laserdisc). I rented the
Abyss on Laserdisc sometime in the 1990’s but did not get a chance to rent or purchase the 480i DVD version when it was released in the year 2000. Now of course I now own this new 3-12-2024 4K Blu-ray disc version which is the best quality version of the movie.
It should be mentioned that the shorter theatrical version and the 31 minute longer special edition version of the
Abyss both received an official PG-13 rating from the MPA for “Language and some scenes of action”. I am still boggled by why action is even mentioned by the MPA. If a human runs across the screen to catch a ball, that is considered action and I see no problem with it. There is nothing wrong with action. What the MPA should have said but did not is, Language and some scenes of violence. Replacing the word violence with action makes no sense. This
Abyss 4K Blu-ray disc incudes both the theatrical and the around 31 minute longer special edition version of the movie. A total of 92.4GB of space out of 100GB is used on the triple layer BD-100 4K Blu-ray disc. A total of 46.4GB of space out of 50GB is used on the dual layer BD-50 2K Blu-ray disc. A total of 21.1GB of space out of 25GB is used on the single layer BD-25 bonus Blu-ray disc. For those families that own 100% 4K Blu-ray players, there is no reason why one should insert the enclosed 2K Blu-ray disc that is labeled as disc two, since disc one which is the 4K Blu-ray disc has better picture and sound quality. All the bonus features for the
Abyss are on the enclosed disc 3 Blu-ray bonus disc that can take at least a couple of days if one reads through all the legacy 2,000+ still photos with scripts and other information. On my year 2016 OPPO UDP-203 4K Blu-ray player the triple layer BD-100 disc had flawless playback even while doing several reverse scans (perfect playback). Because of limitations of my A/V receiver and display the native 4K Dolby Vision HDR movie with lossless 13.1 Dolby Atmos was downscaled to 2K SDR with 7.1 Dolby TrueHD core audio. This
Abyss movie looks and sounds the best it ever has.
*** The following contain some major spoilers so do not read unless one has seen the movie first ***
The bonus features onscreen style electronic book (legacy 480i 4:3 quality) goes into some unclassified details about navy nuclear submarine technologies. Around 35 years ago nuclear submarines for the USA carried around 192 to 196 hydrogen nuclear warheads that have the capability to wipe out an entire continent if World War III were to ever occur. That is one submarine capable of in a few seconds killing around 200 million people after target is reached. And according to the bonus material back in 1989 both the USA and Russia have several dozens of these nuclear submarines. However, 35 years have passed since the release of this movie, and military nuclear weapon technology has improved since the making of the movie. Which means those above numbers would be a lot higher if World War III was a full scale nuclear one. That is one reason why many people want world peace, since some people estimate that if World War III were to occur with a nuclear winter, that only between 0 to 100,000 people on the earth might survive out of the existing population of over 8.1 billion people.
In the fictional
Abyss movie, a nuclear-powered submarine with around 192 or 196 hydrogen warheads by mistake crashes into a cliff located on an underwater mountain. The United States government in this fictional movie with the help of a Seal team hires a group of underwater civilian experts that have designed an underwater oil drilling rig that has up to 1 week of oxygen supply that will be used as base camp for the search and rescue mission. In real life it would be ideal if a military or civilian underwater research base was created someday, that would expand at a future date into a small underwater city. However, an underwater research base or city would need to be powered by nuclear power and if the base was stationary and not moving, would also need a dedicated fiber optic connection from the mainland for 100,000Mbps Internet speeds, cable TV, phone, and other communications. Also, a nuclear-powered underwater research base or city would also need to generate its own breathable air using oxygen machines that would also provide heat through the ventilation system. Also, a water purification system that would turn salt water into drinkable water would be required for a real-life underwater research center.
In this fictional 1989
Abyss movie it shows real technologies like a special liquid breathing technology that allows air breathing organisms to breath oxygen rich liquid that might allow one day deep diving 3,000+ feet in a special deep dive suit. Water only contains 3% oxygen and humans and animals do not have gills like a fish and end up drowning in water when their lungs get full of water. However, around 1962 researches were able to get a rat to breath liquid oxygen material for several hours. Later in the 1970’s dogs and monkeys were successfully tested in a lab to breath liquid oxygen according to the many onscreen textbook slides on the bonus disc. It is rumored that maybe the military might have successfully developed a liquid oxygen suit for humans that allows them to do deep dives without the risk of dying from the pressure of the water at deep depths. The
Abyss movie shows both robotic unmanned subs and human based mini-subs which were state of the art 35 years ago in 1989.
In this fictional
Abyss movie, there is an awesome CPR scene that made the movie famous. Where the underwater oil rig is located on the ocean floor, the temperature of the water is around 34 degrees Fahrenheit which is a couple of degrees above freezing. The fictional character Dr. Lindsey Brigman drowns and since the water is so cold she has up to 10 to 15 minutes for the CPR technology to work, and perhaps double that time for CPR to work under ideal conditions. Anyways during the long intense CPR scene there is a lot of swearing by the character called Bud Bridgman, and the swearing makes the movie seem more realistic. While most people are hoping that the CPR works on Dr. Lindsey Brigman, some people watching the movie are more upset about the fictional character Bud swearing. While the fictional character Bud might be a religious man that believes in the afterlife, in my personal view of Bud, I always considered the Bud character to be an atheist, and when everyone else after several minutes stopped doing CPR and saying it was basically nothing more that could be done and to let her go, Bud went the extra mile and continued the CPR and made the medical team continue to use the defibrillator. Thanks to Bud not giving up on his wife during CPR, the fictional character Dr. Lindsey Brigman came back to life after several minutes of being dead. The cold water extended the time she could safely remain dead and be revived by a CPR medical team.
The
Abyss Special Edition version of the movie is 31 minutes longer and has the wave scenes along with other neat scenes. It is discovered that an intelligent lifeform much more advanced has evolved on the earth that makes humans appear primitive in their technology (some theorized that the aliens in the ocean might have come from another planet a long time ago, while others think the intelligent life under the ocean just evolved as the smartest lifeform on the planet). The intelligent lifeform aliens in the deep ocean have left humans alone while at the same time watching our TV and listening to the human communications. One person on the seal team has a nerves breakdown from all the pressure and without permission sends a nuclear hydrogen warhead fully armed to the
abyss that is around 2.5 to 3.5 miles deep where the so-called advanced alien lifeforms live. But the warhead in the fictional movie is not supposed to go off for an hour, therefore Bud with the special liquid breathing deep dive suit makes a one-way trip to try and disarm the warhead before his oxygen is all gone. Meanwhile the intelligent lifeform alien creatures have the technology to control water in the ocean and any water at the molecular level. Therefore, in the Special Edition of the movie, the aliens create 2,000+ feet tide waves on the west and east coast of North America and most likely all around the world, it appears the aliens are going to use a worldwide flood to bring judgement on humanity. However, at the last moment, all over the world the 2,000+ feet tidal waves stop in mid air for a few minutes as a warning to the humans, and then the tidal waves slowly go in reverse and disappear. The USA, Russia, and the world make peace after this event. Also, what happens is that since Bud risked his life and showed love for the alien species and his wife by saving their lives, the aliens realized that there is hope for the human race, and with their godlike powers stopped the worldwide flood from occurring.
Filming of the
Abyss occurred in an unfinished and never used nuclear power plant that was converted into a 55 feet large pool tank to simulate the ocean on dryland. Making the
Abyss movie was a lot of work for the actors, safety divers, and the director/writer James Cameron. For several months actors sometimes had to work six days a week and each day the actors were underwater for up to 10 hours. James Cameron ended up being underwater for six days a week for 12 hours a day. Even though the tank was only 55 feet deep it was a long enough dive, deep enough dive, and high enough water pressure to require James Cameron to spend one hour each day 10 feet under the water to decompress after a long day of directing actors underwater. Also, many safety divers and crews were used to keep the actors underwater safe. Many months of hard work went into this movie and sometimes over two years’ worth of work for some people like James Cameron.
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