The Abyss (1989)
This podcast episode delves into the complexities and intricacies of James Cameron's film, "The Abyss," a cinematic endeavor that profoundly explores the themes of human endurance and the inherent dangers of deep-sea exploration. We commence by emphasizing the significant aspects of pressurization and the meticulous nature of the film's underwater environment, which serves as a backdrop for the narrative's unfolding tension. The discussion navigates through the emotional depth of the characters, particularly highlighting the performances of Ed Harris and Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, whose portrayals evoke a visceral response in the viewer. We critically analyze the film's latter segments, where the introduction of an alien element arguably detracts from the foundational human drama established earlier in the story. Ultimately, we reflect on the film's lasting impact, acknowledging its merits while lamenting the complications introduced by its more fantastical elements.
Support us:
https://www.patreon.com/whatsourverdict
Email us:
hosts@whatsourverdict.com
Follow us:
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/whatsourverdict
Twitter: @whatsourverdict
Instagram: @whatsourverdict
YouTube: https://youtube.com/channel/UC-K_E-ofs3b85BnoU4R6liA
Visit us:
www.whatsourverdict.com
Transcript
You make a big point about pressurization and de pressurizing or whatever.
Speaker A:And we get the dialogue, hey, it's eight hours in here before we go in there.
Speaker A:And then it's three weeks on our way back up.
Speaker A:Like it takes time.
Speaker A:This is an investment.
Speaker A:30 seconds and everybody's fine.
Speaker B:Welcome to the what's a Bird Podcast where we fashion ourselves cinematic judge and Jerry.
Speaker B:My name is J.J. crowder.
Speaker B:I'm here with my co host Alec Burke.
Speaker B:Purchase.
Speaker B:Let's get it.
Speaker B:Well, we appreciate you tuning in.
Speaker B:Go and hit that follow, subscribe like bell notification buttons.
Speaker B:It helps us grow the podcast.
Speaker B:It also helps us grow the podcast when you tell a friend or family member about us or you tell some deep sea oceanographer, oil drillers, sorry, oh, tell some people that hang out underwater because I'm not going to.
Speaker B:But yeah, we're.
Speaker B:We're into week four of James Cameron films the final week, thankfully.
Speaker B:I never thought that that would be a film like grouping that.
Speaker B:I was like, I'm glad this is over.
Speaker B:But then I recognized and remembered James, what James Cameron is and what he does.
Speaker B:And I'm glad it's over.
Speaker B:And I understand why I never did it myself up to this point.
Speaker B:But yeah, before we jump into that, go check out our Patreon where you can get involved in torturing us, having fun with us, requesting things.
Speaker B:There's all sorts of options.
Speaker B:We revamped it recently.
Speaker B:Only a couple of options for membership that cost you a free membership where you can get involved in voting, things like that.
Speaker B:Ones with costs, come with extra episodes, come with extra behind the scenes content.
Speaker B:Lots of fun stuff to get involved with there.
Speaker B:Plus you get your name shouted out on our episodes at some point, maybe a couple of times.
Speaker B:We tend to have a pretty good relationship with our patrons because it's a small group right now, but we want more.
Speaker B:So yeah, go check it out.
Speaker B:You can also cause us pain.
Speaker A:That's the real reason to go check it out right there.
Speaker B:There are options to make us watch movies we don't want to watch, which is always entertaining, as we've learned for the first half of this year so far.
Speaker A:It's been my favorite couple of months that I've ever been on the podcast with you because you have just been so upset and I've never that upset.
Speaker A:And it was for six weeks straight.
Speaker B:Alex had a ball at the beginning of the year because I have been on a rampage this week and last week have kind of calmed me down thankfully.
Speaker B:But, well, I'm sure we'll get right back to it before it's all said and done with.
Speaker B:But with that, let's jump into this week's episode with the Abyss.
Speaker B: ,: Speaker B:It was written and directed by James Cameron.
Speaker B:It stars Ed Harris, Mary Elizabeth Mastrontine, Mastro Antonio God, Her Name is Rough.
Speaker B:Michael Bean again, Leo Burmeister, Todd Graff, John Bedford Lloyd, Kimberly Scott, Captain Kid Brewer Jr. George Robert Kleck, Adam Nelson, Chris Elliott, Ken Jenkins, Jimmy Ray Weeks and Adam Nelson.
Speaker B:It is about civilian diving team who's enlisted to search for a lost nuclear submarine and faces dangers while encountering an alien aquatic species.
Speaker B:That really oversimplifies this movie quite a bit.
Speaker B:A lot.
Speaker B:But, I mean, it works, I guess.
Speaker B:I. I just don't like that they throw in the alien thing because that's like the least.
Speaker B:It's like the smallest piece of this movie until the very end.
Speaker B:But yeah, it's week four.
Speaker B:It's my pick.
Speaker B:I picked this movie because this is one of the first movies.
Speaker B:I remember seeing this movie when I was a kid on accident.
Speaker B:Like, my dad watched it with my mom when it came.
Speaker B:And so I think this was a 90 when I saw it was in the early 90s because it, you know, back then come to movie theater and then a year later, at best, you'd get it on video, vhs.
Speaker B:And so we used to rent a lot of movies in my house.
Speaker B:We didn't go to a lot of movies, but we rented a lot of movies.
Speaker B:And so I watched this, like, my parents rented this not knowing what it was and that it had some pretty scary in it and some intense stuff.
Speaker B:And then.
Speaker B:Anyway, so I watched it when I think I was like 9 or 10 years old, but I fell in love with it because it was different and it was weird and it was interesting.
Speaker B:And it takes place in this really interesting set and location and something that adds a level of drama even when there's nothing dramatic happening on the screen.
Speaker B:Which is really a cool, I think, underutilized aspect of moviemaking and storytelling.
Speaker B:Like, if you can, I think we try to recreate it, but the recreation is like, in an unknown place, right?
Speaker B:But so there's a level of danger.
Speaker B:But being underwater like that, that's a different level of constant danger.
Speaker B:Like, it's not because something's in the woods and can find you.
Speaker B:It's because at any moment, if something goes wrong, you're period, it's not.
Speaker B:And there's not an easy fix.
Speaker B:Right?
Speaker B:Like, and at that depth, like you can't just climb into a suit and float to the surface.
Speaker B:There's too much pressure change.
Speaker B:You'll kill yourself and it.
Speaker B:And so it's, it's a whole nother level of tension that's there because anything that goes wrong can kill everyone.
Speaker B:And so I love that aspect to it.
Speaker B:And then as everything starts to go wrong, you're like, oh, so I just think it's cool.
Speaker B:I think it's an interesting story, to be honest.
Speaker B:I think it goes a little off the rails when the alien starts getting involved so heavily at the end.
Speaker B:But we'll get into that, I'm sure.
Speaker B:But I, I picked this movie because.
Speaker A:To me.
Speaker B:Outside of Terminator, the original Terminator and even Terminator 2, I think this is arguably James Cameron's best work.
Speaker B:The ironic part about that is this is also probably one of the most slept on James Cameron movies.
Speaker B:I, if you were to ask 90 of people, I would say maybe even 95 of people, James Cameron's best movies.
Speaker B:This would never make the list.
Speaker B:Not because it's not, but because most people don't even know it exists.
Speaker B:It exists.
Speaker B:And especially that it's a James Cameron film.
Speaker B:And I, I don't think without this film, I don't think Titanic, Avatar, I don't think some of that gets made because I think this is the one where people started to realize, oh, he can make an original epic, like interesting, hard to make movie and make it good.
Speaker B:And I wish this movie was more successful because the cast is outrageous, the acting is amazing, and the story is really interesting.
Speaker B:And there's a lot at stake until the very end.
Speaker B:And at the end, it kind of like said it goes off the rails a little, which I think is what probably kept this movie from being as successful as it could have been.
Speaker B:But that's why I picked it.
Speaker B:It was never.
Speaker B:This was the one movie that the instant we knew I knew we were doing James Cameron, this was at the top of my list.
Speaker B:And then I was like, I don't want to do any of this.
Speaker B:So we're gonna go back to the 80s because those are the only movies I was like, okay.
Speaker B:Those are the only I care to watch.
Speaker B:So, yeah.
Speaker B:Anyway.
Speaker B:Had you seen this before?
Speaker B:I'm assuming you, you had not.
Speaker A:Had not seen it.
Speaker A:Wow.
Speaker A:And so just hearing you talk about it, because I kind of in.
Speaker A:I'm in the same boat, is like, James Cameron did really well with this movie.
Speaker A:I also think he it up.
Speaker B:Oh, yeah.
Speaker A:But the, the, the interesting thing is, like, this is One of his only movies where you don't have the typical star studded cast.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:You.
Speaker A:You still have a great cast.
Speaker B:Yep.
Speaker A:But you don't have the.
Speaker A:Just top to bottom.
Speaker A:There's 10, 12, 15 recognizable names on the cast list.
Speaker A:You have.
Speaker A:In this case, like, there's four, maybe five.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:And so you.
Speaker A:It is a sleeper because nobody.
Speaker A:You know James Cameron.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:Titanic's up there.
Speaker A:You got Avatar, got Terminator.
Speaker A:You even have Aliens.
Speaker A:Nobody goes to Ed Harris in the Abyss.
Speaker A:And so I wonder if he saw this and was like, you know, that's it.
Speaker A:From here on out, I'm just gonna get everybody that I can.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Just thrown in there because this, this was a great movie.
Speaker A:I got a lot of problems with it, but it was a great movie and I think he screwed it up.
Speaker A:And I'll just jump right into.
Speaker A:I think he screwed it up by adding the aliens because he's James Cameron and apparently can't make a movie about aliens at this point.
Speaker A:I'm surprised he didn't throw aliens into the Titanic.
Speaker B:They were in the glacier.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Because God damn, that's what ruined this movie.
Speaker A:You already.
Speaker A:And we talked about this this entire goddamn month.
Speaker A:He does too much.
Speaker A:And you already have enough happening that causes these guys to be trapped in the oil rig underwater.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:No rescue coming.
Speaker A:That's enough.
Speaker A:You don't have to add in this element of aliens and good, bad, you know, never knowing what's going on with them.
Speaker A:This uncertainty.
Speaker A:You don't need it because you already have that with your Navy SEAL who's gone through hps.
Speaker A:So it's.
Speaker A:It's once again just throwing too much in there as almost distraction when you already have a compelling story.
Speaker A:You take aliens out of this.
Speaker A:I think it's.
Speaker A:It's one of the best movies.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Ever made.
Speaker A:But you throw aliens in there as you're MacGuffing your plot as to why this sub went down, which caused him to go, you know, to begin with, it's too much.
Speaker A:And then your aliens turn out to be nothing.
Speaker A:Really.
Speaker A:Just exploring.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Just in their giant underwater spaceship.
Speaker A:Like, you know, there's.
Speaker A:There's no payoff for it.
Speaker A:And so it just becomes easily forgettable.
Speaker A:Plot McGuffin.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Be like, okay, well, I guess that's cool.
Speaker A:Whatever.
Speaker A:But you already had your compelling story.
Speaker A:You did not need aliens, but because James Cameron needs aliens.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Threw aliens in there and it ruined it, in my opinion.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:Well, I swear to God, dude, that the only reason he added aliens to this movie was Two things.
Speaker B:One, the most obvious being there's no other way to get him out of this deal, in his opinion.
Speaker B:Right?
Speaker B:Which I think to me.
Speaker B:Okay, I'm gonna stop there and we'll come back to that in a second.
Speaker B:And the second one is so that he could do the cool water visual effects because again, like an every other James Cameron movie, with the exception of a couple, he has to push the envelope, which I appreciate.
Speaker B: And at the time in: Speaker B:People lost their minds about the digital effects in this film because it just was so ahead of its time.
Speaker B:Nobody was doing computer animation in.
Speaker B:In real movies like that.
Speaker B:Not to that extent.
Speaker B:So again, he changed the game, which is awesome.
Speaker B:But we.
Speaker B:I go back to my first point, and that is he.
Speaker B:He needed these aliens to be able to have everybody get out of the water.
Speaker B:Don't let them get out of the water.
Speaker B:How insane would this movie be if one person made it out in a sub, right?
Speaker B:Or one person.
Speaker B:Or nobody makes it and it becomes like a tragedy of like the Edmund and Fitzgerald, right?
Speaker B:Like nobody survives.
Speaker B:But there's a great story here to be told and what, you know, you could even have it be.
Speaker B:Dude, you could even have it be someone listening because.
Speaker B:Have you heard the song?
Speaker A:The.
Speaker B:The Edmund Fitzgerald song?
Speaker B:The Wreck of the Eminent Jail.
Speaker B:Great song.
Speaker B:Six minutes long.
Speaker B:People didn't want to play it on the radio.
Speaker B:Amazing storytelling.
Speaker B:So interesting.
Speaker B:You could have it be a song.
Speaker B:This mom and dad or this dad and kid are driving in a car and you hear this song.
Speaker B:Come on.
Speaker B:About this tragedy that happened underwater, right?
Speaker B:The.
Speaker B:Whatever the oil rig or whatever that rig's name is.
Speaker B:What is this?
Speaker B:And you tell this story and then it cuts to us on this thing and all the shit's going wrong.
Speaker B:And that's.
Speaker B:To me, what happened is the.
Speaker B:And I'm sure, really James Cameron was like, I want to make a movie about aliens that takes place underwater.
Speaker B:That's more like it.
Speaker B:But it feels like he's like, I want to make this movie that's underwater in this oil rig.
Speaker B:And how do I get them out so that everybody survives?
Speaker B:Or most everybody survives, right?
Speaker B:And in order to do that, we need aliens who.
Speaker B:It just so happens that the entire oil rig sitting on top of their spaceship, that's been underwater for who the knows how long now, Which.
Speaker B:So.
Speaker B:And I think that's my big.
Speaker B:I would just jump right to gripes.
Speaker B:My biggest gripe with this movie is it create.
Speaker B:By the time I'm done, it Creates more questions than answers about a question that I don't actually care about.
Speaker B:Like I, I find myself at the end of this movie almost every time going, yeah, but what about the aliens?
Speaker B:Like why were they there?
Speaker B:How long have they been there?
Speaker B:What are they doing down there?
Speaker A:Why?
Speaker B:How, why have they been just down there this whole time?
Speaker B:You're not going to find much underwater, especially not that deep that has anything to do with humans.
Speaker B:So if you're there for the human part of it, you up.
Speaker B:If you're not there, then why the are you there?
Speaker B:And then I went, wait, why am I asking these questions?
Speaker B:I just watched this really interesting movie about human nature and the dangers of being underwater and some very great acting.
Speaker B:Like some of the best acting I think of when people ask me what's some of the best acting movies.
Speaker B:This is on my list because Ed Harris, Michael Bean, absolutely kill it.
Speaker B:And that's just the two main guys.
Speaker B:And then you throw in.
Speaker B:And I always forget her name too, because it's Mary Elizabeth.
Speaker B:Master Antonio, who at the time was nobody.
Speaker B:She didn't get big for a minute until we did another one of our movies that we've done.
Speaker B:And that being Robin Hood, Prince of Thieves, like that's what really got her.
Speaker B:Big, big.
Speaker B:But this movie was.
Speaker B:She does great and like arguably steals the move the lead from this movie from Ed Harris, which is hard to do because Ed Harris is Ed Harris and Michael Bean is like one of those.
Speaker B:Has always been again, rest in peace.
Speaker B:One of those sleeper guys that's chews up scenes and you know, James Cameron put him to good use a few times.
Speaker B:So I don't know, like I.
Speaker B:That's my biggest beef with this movie and I think it probably will be with anybody.
Speaker B:If you're looking to watch this movie, you can quit when the aliens end up actually getting there in full force near the end.
Speaker B:But they also run the risk of like, you can't watch this movie and skip the descent that Michael, that Ed Harris does.
Speaker B:God, what a heart wrenching moment when he's down there and he's in that breathing.
Speaker B:God damn.
Speaker B:That's an intense 25 minutes of scene.
Speaker B:And the emotion that gets played out.
Speaker B:God, the fucking acting is unbelievable.
Speaker B:And the fact that it's being typed, half of it's being typed and read on a screen.
Speaker B:Genius, dude.
Speaker B:So it's just like there's so much good to this movie and even like the little mystery piece.
Speaker B:But I would have loved if instead of it being aliens, they're all going nuts and hallucinating this water.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker B:Like, to me, that would have been more interesting because you're like, what is this?
Speaker B:Why is this water column going through?
Speaker B:No, it's that they're all suffering from some level of pressure sickness, and they're at different stages.
Speaker B:And it just so happens that Michael Bean's going through it the worst because he's got this military, anxious, wannabe fighting mind.
Speaker B:So it's making him cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs because that worked really well, but the rest of them are suffering from it, too.
Speaker B:And so it's.
Speaker A:I don't know.
Speaker B:I think there was a lot you could have done as crazy as this for me to say out loud to make this movie even better, but God damn, is it good?
Speaker B:In so many ways.
Speaker A:I think, going back to your point about.
Speaker A:I think about how he made this movie, I think it was.
Speaker A:He had this underwater thing and need to get him out.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Because they're all dead.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:You brought him back up on an alien spaceship.
Speaker A:You make a big point about pressurization and d. You know, pressurizing, whatever.
Speaker A:And we get the dialogue.
Speaker A:Hey, it's eight hours in here before we go in there.
Speaker A:And then it's three weeks on our way back up.
Speaker A:Like, it takes time.
Speaker A:This is an investment.
Speaker A:30 seconds and everybody's fine.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:You know, and so I was watching that, and that's where it was like, what the.
Speaker A:You know, what's the point of it?
Speaker A:And I. I like the idea of having them all die, except I would have kept Darren Harris live because he's got the fluid fair.
Speaker A:And so I would have had.
Speaker A:I would have done something similar to that.
Speaker A:But it takes that compelling moment.
Speaker A:And when you were talking about that, the movie that popped into my head, which is around the same time, is the Perfect Storm where everybody dies.
Speaker A:And I think Mary Elizabeth is in that one as well.
Speaker B:I think she is.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:And so.
Speaker A:But that's where the connection popped in my head.
Speaker A:But you have everything set up to have this really dramatic.
Speaker A:You know, everything's gone wrong for this crew as soon as they took the job.
Speaker A:You know, just.
Speaker A:And it wasn't a job they necessarily took.
Speaker A:It was a job that they were voluntold for.
Speaker A:And, you know, they don't want to be there.
Speaker A:And then thing after thing after thing goes wrong.
Speaker A:You don't need aliens, which you.
Speaker A:With the whole story unfolding, you have this human nature of, you know, they're.
Speaker A:They're forced into this.
Speaker A:They don't want to be there.
Speaker A:Everything that could go wrong is going wrong while it's happening.
Speaker A:And there's.
Speaker A:There's no.
Speaker A:There's no real chance of getting rescued past a certain point.
Speaker B:Mm.
Speaker A:And it's when that cable gets cut from the ship because their flatbed or whatever was taken.
Speaker B:Yep.
Speaker A:They couldn't untether themselves, so they got untethered.
Speaker A:And that's.
Speaker A:At that point, they're.
Speaker A:They're done.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:And then you just have this almost slow descent into everybody kind of realizing that fact that it's.
Speaker A:This is the end of the road because they.
Speaker A:They've been left without their lifeline.
Speaker A:But instead we get alien surfacing and all.
Speaker A:Everybody's fine.
Speaker A:Happy go, lucky.
Speaker A:Here we go.
Speaker A:We're all good.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:But is it.
Speaker A:So it's tricky because there's.
Speaker A:There's so many parts of this where it's really good dialogue.
Speaker A:The back and forth.
Speaker A:Ed Harris, Mary Elizabeth going back and forth over there.
Speaker A:You know, marriage slash, divorce or separated thing.
Speaker A:Very good.
Speaker A:You got the.
Speaker A:The little squeaky guy with the rat.
Speaker A:And he does a great job of being that kind of unrealized genius almost in many ways.
Speaker A:And so he's.
Speaker A:He's that techie, spazzy guy that is, you know, keeping everything kind of running while it's happening.
Speaker A:But he does a great job in his scenes.
Speaker A:The crew that they built so great and more time with them just kind of realizing, like, hey, this is kind of.
Speaker A:It would have been better served, in my opinion, than having this miraculous, you know, oh, everybody saved and we're happy now.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:This whole payoff, like, I think it'd be really great if, you know, at the kind of the end where you have the ship radio and down, and it's just, you know, silence.
Speaker A:Batch.
Speaker A:Silence.
Speaker A:Batch, silence back.
Speaker A:And just have that.
Speaker A:Yeah, yeah, dope.
Speaker A:Because then.
Speaker A:Then you add this almost real consequences in to what's happening.
Speaker A:And then you also have the added, we'll say, bonus of the.
Speaker A:The people on the boat, the corporate guys.
Speaker A:Corporation.
Speaker A:That is the reason for these oil workers going here.
Speaker A:Told to do it, didn't have a choice, can't say no.
Speaker A:And you have a, you know, real consequences now for that.
Speaker A:Because now that everybody's alive, that company hasn't learned anything.
Speaker A:Everybody made out alive.
Speaker A:We're good.
Speaker A:We're fine.
Speaker A:And so now it's gonna.
Speaker A:Now, potentially, you have that happening again and again and again and again.
Speaker A:Because there's no real consequences for just being like, oh, yeah, no 100 cooperation with the.
Speaker A:With the Navy.
Speaker A:Yeah, sure.
Speaker A:Just take the risk.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:And so it's in my.
Speaker A:In for me, it kind of ruined a little bit.
Speaker A:Because once again, as with this entire month, James Cameron has the recipe.
Speaker B:Yep.
Speaker A:He just.
Speaker A:He just wants what he wants.
Speaker A:He goes that way.
Speaker B:Yep.
Speaker B:He always does too much.
Speaker B:And I.
Speaker B:You know, it's.
Speaker B:It's.
Speaker B:Yeah, it's one of those things.
Speaker B:And I.
Speaker B:And I.
Speaker B:There's been a couple movies, and I don't remember what they were, but this is one of those definitely ones where I'm like, if you could stop watching it at point.
Speaker B:Like, as soon as Ed Harris ends up, like, gets saved by the little flying sea angel, like, stop.
Speaker B:Just turn it off and just pretend everybody died.
Speaker B:And then you've got one of the better movies I think I've ever seen in my life, ever.
Speaker B:Because to your point, like, the.
Speaker B:The emotion and the.
Speaker B:The dialogue, like.
Speaker B:And this is to Ed Harris and.
Speaker B:And Mary Elizabeth, their acting credit.
Speaker B:Like, when the two of them think that they're dying.
Speaker B:Like, when he saved.
Speaker B:When they're.
Speaker B:She's drowned, basically, in this whole.
Speaker B:Like, somebody's gotta die, but I'm gonna bring you back because you're gonna go hypothermic.
Speaker B:Like, the emotion in that scene, dude, kills me.
Speaker B:Like.
Speaker B:And Ed Harris, just, like, one.
Speaker B:She recovers from that a little too fast because he's beating the absolute out of her with the.
Speaker B:There's broken chest compressions and the slant.
Speaker B:Yeah, she's hurt, but, like, his whole emotion where he refuses to quit and, like, Ed Harris is, like, desperate voice.
Speaker B:Like, when that voice raises and he gets that almost, like, high pitch to it to a certain degree.
Speaker B:God, he's like, just insanely good.
Speaker B:And then on the flip side, when she's.
Speaker B:When he's down diving to get the bomb and disarm it and, like, he's typing all wonky and, like, it's too long and she's telling him to bail out.
Speaker B:And, like, her emotion is like.
Speaker B:And then I love it because in both of those scenes, nobody's really talking except one of the.
Speaker B:One of them.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:But everybody's still there showing the emotion that they're feeling, but they're conceding the scene to the person that feels the most emotion.
Speaker B:And that's something that you don't see a lot in today's Hollywood.
Speaker B:Like, when you get.
Speaker B:Especially in ensemble cast, with the amount of ensemble cast we have in Hollywood these days, everybody's got to have their time to shine.
Speaker B:Right?
Speaker B:And I love that in this movie, in the seriously emotional bits, the people that shine are the people that should.
Speaker B:And everybody else is there and they're adding to the scene in the way that they should be versus we don't.
Speaker B:I don't have this competing emotional drama between two very good actors because they got to get their screen time.
Speaker B:Or, you know, a director thinks, well, I've got both these heavyweights, or all three.
Speaker B:We gotta have their time.
Speaker B:No, off actual emotion.
Speaker B:And like, that is subtle.
Speaker B:And it's, It's.
Speaker B:It's usually nuclearized by one person.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:Like, they're in the middle and everybody else is feeling it radiate.
Speaker B:Whether it's someone died and everybody's feeling that or whether someone has this high level of emotion and everyone else can relate to it, but they can't feel it on the same level.
Speaker B:So you're in this awkward what do I do?
Speaker B:Situation.
Speaker B:I can't help.
Speaker B:I don't want to make things worse.
Speaker B:It's.
Speaker B:And they play that in this so well.
Speaker B:And the same goes with, like, I love the whole Michael Bean playing crazy because when you first meet him, you're like, oh, he's a nice guy, he's cool, he's fun.
Speaker B:And then he's like, scary because you have someone with that kind of Navy SEAL training stuck in a box, a tin can and going nuts.
Speaker B:That's horrifying.
Speaker B:And so there's just so many elements to this movie that I'm like, you had lightning in a bottle and then you invited aliens to the party and it all up at the end.
Speaker B:But, God, when it was the first two hours of this movie, actually, probably, yeah, because I think the alien, the whole Ed Harris in the ship, probably about 10, 15 minutes, and then it's another five to 10 to get him up out of the service.
Speaker B:So, yeah, probably the last 20 minutes.
Speaker B:That's unnecessary.
Speaker B:This movie is another.
Speaker B:Because it's too long.
Speaker B:2 hours and 20 minutes is too long for this movie.
Speaker B:Again, that's James Cameron.
Speaker B:But if you cut that out and to your point, like, you just have the static or.
Speaker B:And I would love the last 10 minutes to be the realization of, we're done.
Speaker B:So we're going to continue to live down here until we either run out of food, run out of air, or you make the decision.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:Or you have, like, not only that, but they're.
Speaker B:They're on a cliff's edge.
Speaker B:Maybe the.
Speaker B:Something happens and the cliff starts to cr.
Speaker B:I mean, there's so many different options that you can have to show these folks are not going to come back up.
Speaker B:But I don't want them to.
Speaker B:As much as I fall in love with these characters and almost every one of them you have some attachment to.
Speaker B:I. I don't want them to because it's so unrealistic to me that they survive.
Speaker B:That you have to bring in aliens and on an unnatural piece of a story.
Speaker B:Beat that.
Speaker B:That saves the day.
Speaker B:I don't love it.
Speaker B:And I realized, listen, back in the 90s, everybody had to survive.
Speaker B:Early late 80s, early 90s.
Speaker B:You can't have like, it didn't test well when people.
Speaker B:But I would love a remake of this movie.
Speaker B:And everybody dies.
Speaker B:Like, and no aliens.
Speaker B:It's just this intense, dramatic thriller underwater that, you know, can't end well.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:So I thought we were wrapping up when Ed Harris is fighting Michael Bean in the moon bay and then there's still an hour left.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Because that's like the climatic fight is between the two of them.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:And we're, we still keep going and going and going and like it got to the point where.
Speaker A: ou have Ed Harris swimming at: Speaker A:Not sure how healthy that is for the body or if it can even be done, but he's just going back through.
Speaker A:So you have this big kind of build up to.
Speaker A:He's, you know, left the Haven.
Speaker A:No suit, no nothing.
Speaker A:Just left the Haven to go save the day, you know, pops out of the water, it's hand to hand combat, you know, ends up, ends up holding himself pretty well.
Speaker A:And that should be like where you start wrapping it up.
Speaker A:And if you're gonna do a rescue, that's when it, that's when you interject it to where the, the storm's done, the ship's back, they're setting down another crew, whatever it may be, what have you.
Speaker A:Like there, there's.
Speaker A:There's a plan now in place.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Versus instead we get another hour where now there's the, the, you know, chase scene with the nuke and then the nuke goes off the cliff, but we forget about it for X amount of minutes.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Until there was like four times in this movie where I was like, oh, it's ending and there was something else.
Speaker A:Yeah, and there was something else.
Speaker A:And then there was something else and there's something else.
Speaker A:And it just kept on going to where by the end I was like, I was shocked at where they ended it with the aliens because I expected there to be more and a little bit more of a Wrap up.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:No, that was, is.
Speaker A:It was weird because there were so many places you could have ended it and still had this almost, we'll say rescue capability.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:But instead we went to aliens and then we got the black screen.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:And it was just like, okay, well, sorry, but I'm getting a little bit more now.
Speaker A:Almost like, hey, you went too far now I need you to make it longer to finish explaining what's going on.
Speaker B:Yep.
Speaker A:Because we get nothing.
Speaker A:We don't even really get the, the explanation that we get for why the aliens helped him is like his last type message.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:But that there's no extra explanation of why.
Speaker A:Like it focuses in on wife or whatever so they have a understanding, I guess.
Speaker A:But at that point, like, no, now, sorry, James Cameron, I need an extra 20 minutes.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Of this new thing that you added in.
Speaker A:But you should have ended it at that point like an hour and a half ago.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Is where you could have ended it and still had everybody safe.
Speaker A:But gotta put aliens in everything.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:Well.
Speaker B:And it's to your point, like I've never understood that either.
Speaker B:Like, okay, so he.
Speaker B:Love saved the day.
Speaker B:The aliens understood.
Speaker A:They're still getting divorced on Monday.
Speaker A:The paper's been signed.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:No, well.
Speaker B:And like I, I don't know, like they've been living underwater for all this time and a very far underwater.
Speaker B:And I'm sorry, but these aliens, the way that they look like they're not coming out and hanging out and we're not catching it.
Speaker B:You know what I mean?
Speaker B:Like, so how do they even comprehend?
Speaker B:I.
Speaker B:Like I said, every time I watch this movie, I end up finishing it with more questions than I started with.
Speaker B:Which is good in some cases in some movies, but not in this one because it's not questions that I have about the Right.
Speaker B:They have questions about these aliens that to me don't add any value to this story.
Speaker B:In fact, they detract from the value that this story tells and that is human nature in one of the most impossible situations ever existed.
Speaker B:And so I don't actually get to see the payoff of this terrible situation because now I'm too focused on the flying angels that why the.
Speaker B:Are they even there?
Speaker B:And then.
Speaker B:Yeah, it's.
Speaker B:So it's a letdown at the end of the movie, which frustrates me every time I watch it.
Speaker B:But then if I just tune it out and I go, James Cameron's a sometimes.
Speaker B:But man, what he made up to, getting up to that point was unreal.
Speaker B:Because I'll tell you What?
Speaker B:Dude?
Speaker B:One of my biggest fears in life is drowning.
Speaker B:Like, water scares the.
Speaker B:I love water.
Speaker B:I love swimming a lot.
Speaker B:The ocean scares the out of me.
Speaker B:One drowning scares the of me.
Speaker B:No matter what body of water it is.
Speaker B:But the ocean scares the out of me because there's down there we'll never know about.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:Period.
Speaker B:Because it's just too.
Speaker B:There's just.
Speaker B:You can't put the.
Speaker B:That we could send down there.
Speaker B:It doesn't last very long.
Speaker B:And it's so vast and massive that you could send a million cameras down there and not catch everything that's going on.
Speaker A:So you need 360 degree view at all times.
Speaker A:Because if you're looking something, something.
Speaker A:Something else going on behind you.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:And still be able to cover 80% of the Earth's.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:Popular mass.
Speaker B:You know what I mean?
Speaker B:Like, it's impossible.
Speaker B:So the ocean scares the out of me.
Speaker B:So the idea of all of those things being stuck underwater in a Pro in a building that could literally cave in on itself if one thing goes wrong and destroy.
Speaker B:Like we've seen recently in the last five years what even a minimal amount of pressure underwater can do to a piece of metal or fiberglass or whatever the.
Speaker B:That submarine was made of.
Speaker B:You take a whole building that's mega metal and put it even further underwater than what they win and then have go wrong off.
Speaker B:That's fear incarnate.
Speaker B:And then on top of that, the physical effects that it has on your body, like.
Speaker B:And I think they talk about it, that ages your ass like when you're under there and that.
Speaker B:That's a different type of living.
Speaker B:And like real underwater workers, like don't stay at massive depths for very long.
Speaker B:Like they go down there, they do some few days, then they come back up and they take like a month on the.
Speaker B:Because your body has to balance back out because it's not meant to do that.
Speaker B:So all of these things make me uncomfortable from the very beginning of the movie.
Speaker B:And then the more shit goes wrong, the more uncomfortable I get.
Speaker B:There are very few minute movies, even horror movies, scared that make my skin crawl as much as this movie does.
Speaker B:Because it's like unlocking a fear for me on so many levels.
Speaker B:So.
Speaker B:And then it just.
Speaker B:And they play that so well because everybody in there is feeling that.
Speaker B:Even the people that have been down there and are comfortable with it.
Speaker B:This is their job.
Speaker B:They know what they're doing.
Speaker B:You can tell.
Speaker B:They start to get panicky and worried.
Speaker B:And you're like, if they're worried, I'm Yeah, you know, it's.
Speaker B:And it comes through in the acting.
Speaker B:Like, you feel that.
Speaker B:That discomfort throughout this movie, which I think is just a credit to the acting and the storytelling up to a point.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:No, it's.
Speaker A:It's crazy bringing that up because I don't necessarily have that same fear that you have, but I've also never been really super far out in.
Speaker A:In the ocean.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:Like, the farthest I think I've gone is, because I grew up in San Diego, is we'd go swim to buoy, quarter mile, maybe a half mile out.
Speaker A:Like, that's the farthest that I've ever been out.
Speaker A:And if you get out there, like, you can trick yourself into, like, you know, like, oh, but you're still on the shelf at that point.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Like, it.
Speaker A:Like, your depth that you're talking about is.
Speaker A:I know the exact.
Speaker A:But probably.
Speaker A:Probably at the most, 100, 100ft deep.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:Like, and that's not too much, considering that it goes down miles if you get into really deep ocean.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:And so you could trick yourself out when you're out just a quarter mile, you know, 50, 60, maybe 100ft deep in places.
Speaker A:And, you know, but you're still on the coast, very much on the shelf.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:And so you're talking.
Speaker A:They're 2,000ft.
Speaker A:You know, it's taking that, multiplying it by a ton.
Speaker A:And the things that they are feeling or seen, because now you're not at the top treading water.
Speaker A:You're at the bottom of it.
Speaker B:Everything.
Speaker A:Everything in between is what you got to worry about.
Speaker A:And like, you.
Speaker B:You.
Speaker A:Even if you go out, like, from the coast to where you can no longer touch, like, your mind can play tricks on you.
Speaker A:What is underneath me.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:And we're talking eight feet deep, which is, you know, barely past the breakers in some cases, or maybe you're still in front of the breakers.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:And so it's.
Speaker A:It's wild to think that.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:So I think people are like, oh, yeah, I have.
Speaker A:I have no fear of, like, the deep ocean.
Speaker A:You just haven't been out far enough.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Consider.
Speaker B:Okay, so like, the Mariana Trench, which is like, the deepest part of the ocean that we know about.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker B:Is deeper than the highest mountain is tall off.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:That's, like, to the bottom of that now.
Speaker B:Dude, that's.
Speaker B:That's.
Speaker B:That's unfathomable in my brain to think about a hole in the earth covered in water that's deeper than the tallest mountain is tall, because you look at like the mountains.
Speaker B:Like you.
Speaker B:You.
Speaker B:Dude, I'm not.
Speaker B:That's deep and that's.
Speaker B:And that's horrifying to me.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Like, because you don't know under the.
Speaker B:Water it's my ass.
Speaker B:I'm not even.
Speaker B:I don't even like swimming to the bottom of the deep end of a pool.
Speaker B:You.
Speaker A:I don't.
Speaker A:Your ears pop with pressure going down 12ft, dude.
Speaker B:And I've been on cruise ships.
Speaker B:I've been out in the middle of the ocean where you look around you and there's nothing but water.
Speaker B:And I was like, cruises aren't for me.
Speaker A:No, thank you.
Speaker B:I'm out.
Speaker B:And then you see like these, you know, the cruise ships that flip over, the ones that are stranded out in the.
Speaker B:I'm out.
Speaker B:Because nothing good.
Speaker B:Nothing good in that situation.
Speaker A:I.
Speaker B:Like I said, I went on a cruise.
Speaker B:It's like an eight hour cruise.
Speaker B:The first time I ever went on a big, big, big boat for a long period of time was from Florida to the Bahamas.
Speaker B:And it took less than a day to get there.
Speaker B:And I.
Speaker B:But there were times when you're like, nothing but water.
Speaker B:And I'm like, I'm out.
Speaker B:Nope, done.
Speaker B:So I can't be imagined being out there in that level and underneath it.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:2,000 fear unlocked.
Speaker B:I'm out.
Speaker B:That's horrifying.
Speaker B:I get like, I'm antsy just talking about it.
Speaker B:So that's where to me like, God, what a great movie and story and.
Speaker A:Play on the fear a little bit more.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And.
Speaker B:And make it more realistic.
Speaker B:Like just have a dark, gritty movie that doesn't end well.
Speaker B:And even if somebody survives, I'm fine with that.
Speaker B:But I need.
Speaker B:I need there to be some dire circumstances.
Speaker B:I need not everybody to make it out.
Speaker B:Because aliens love that.
Speaker B:He loved his soon to be ex wife.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:Off James Cameron.
Speaker B:All right, should we rate it?
Speaker A:Good.
Speaker B:Okay.
Speaker B:I love this movie.
Speaker B:We poo pooed it a lot there at the end, the alien part.
Speaker B:But I love this movie.
Speaker B:I stick to my guns that this is one of my.
Speaker B:It's at least in my top 20.
Speaker B:It may be in my top 10 if I really got down.
Speaker B:But because of the first two hours of this movie, it's intense, it's uncomfortable.
Speaker B:It's to me very realistic in the way that human nature would take over in a lot of cases.
Speaker B:It plays on fears that I don't think a lot of people even recognize that they have.
Speaker B:There are some spots where I'm with you.
Speaker B:Like that water, him getting out of that water and fighting so well, I don't care how much adrenaline you have, like that's cold ass water.
Speaker B:And if they've already wrecked like they've, they've talked about later, the fact that it will kill you, you'll have diapermy.
Speaker B:Listen, this is not a good thing to be swimming around in.
Speaker B:There's pressure problems.
Speaker B:So there's a lot of things that are probably very unrealistic from a serious point of view, but I don't give a about that.
Speaker B:What I care about is how the human nature and the dialogue and the, the intensity and the tension plays through.
Speaker B:And it comes through amazingly in this movie.
Speaker B:The acting is outrageous.
Speaker B:I love the idea of it.
Speaker B:I just don't love that it gets weird with the aliens halfway through the movie and then at the end, full on, full tilt changes the nature of what we've just watched.
Speaker B:It makes it a whole different movie by the end.
Speaker B:So I don't love that.
Speaker B:So with all that said, I'm gonna give this a I want again.
Speaker B:There's another situation where I want to give it a five because I think what it does perfect, it does very perfect.
Speaker B:But then it gets up at the end and it's too long regardless.
Speaker B:It's too long.
Speaker B:So four for me, I again, this is another movie that I will watch anytime, any place, with anyone.
Speaker B:And I just.
Speaker B:And I'm glad I was able to introduce it to you like this is.
Speaker B:I love this film and I try again.
Speaker B:It's a sleeper film that a lot of people have never even heard of, let alone watched.
Speaker B:So I love to introduce it to people.
Speaker A:All right, I'm gonna be same for the aliens.
Speaker A:Ruin it for me.
Speaker A:And the problem with the alien aspect and the type of person that I am is now because you've introduced it, I put everything else under the microscope.
Speaker A:So, for example, the swimming scene, I don't even care about that, provided there are no aliens.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Because I'm engrossed in the movie.
Speaker A:But this, you start introducing the supernatural alien kind of what's going to happen and nothing.
Speaker A:Then there's no payoff.
Speaker A:Yeah, you bet your ass.
Speaker A:I'm going to go back and be like, well, what was this for?
Speaker A:What was this for?
Speaker A:What was this for?
Speaker A:So I think that hurts it because those are sins that I will excuse in any other movie provided that it all makes sense.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:And I don't end the movie going, well, wait a minute, what the heck?
Speaker A:Because Ben, I'm starting to go back and now I'll Nitpick and I'll be like, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom.
Speaker A:What with this, what with that?
Speaker A:We should have done this better and you know, type of a an idea on it.
Speaker A:So I'll give it a four.
Speaker A:Watching it again.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:I don't know how frequently or, you know, it's not going to become necessarily a regular watch for me, but I would enjoy watching this again because I think there's a lot more to unpack in it that you don't get from just one watch.
Speaker A:So I watch again.
Speaker A:I'll give it four.
Speaker A:But it's a good movie.
Speaker B:Yeah, the aliens.
Speaker B:So dumb.
Speaker B:Well, there it is.
Speaker B:The Abyss and the end of James Cameron month.
Speaker B:Thankfully, as much as I've enjoyed the last two films, I'm still glad James Cameron movies are over.
Speaker B:And it started torturously for me.
Speaker B:Ugh.
Speaker B:I think I might almost be rather locked in a deep sea.
Speaker B:Goddamn oil rig.
Speaker B:Watch those two movies ever again.
Speaker B:Talking about Avatar.
Speaker B:I hate that.
Speaker B:Anyway, with that, I like tell everybody where they can find us when we're not fearing for our lives stuck in an oil rig.
Speaker A:Happy to.
Speaker A:Best place to find US is on YouTube at what's Our verdict?
Speaker A:You can see our faces, smiling faces.
Speaker A:Or for the first six weeks of this year, you can see JJ's mad face.
Speaker A:It's brilliant.
Speaker A:That's the best place to actually see us and kind of while we're talking about the movie.
Speaker A:But if you're gonna listen, best place to listen is on wherever you get your podcast.
Speaker A:Best place to get involved with our content though is on Patreon at what's our Verge reviews?
Speaker A:We have several different tiers, so if you guys just want to join up, want to get involved in the voting process, that's completely free, please go on and vote.
Speaker A:JJ just revealed a list, a movie that's on one of my lists for pain.
Speaker A:You please go vote for my movie.
Speaker A:Never have to watch this this because it, it will break me.
Speaker A:But we added real stakes to our votes.
Speaker A:So if you lose a month, your list gets up.
Speaker A:If you lose three in a row, your really bad list gets up.
Speaker A:So don't please get on and vote and vote for my movie so I never have to watch Dolly.
Speaker A:That would be terrifying.
Speaker B:As well.
Speaker A:Patreon.
Speaker A:We do have extra bonus content.
Speaker A:Everything from bloops and outtakes all the way up to full length episodes of movies that nobody should watch, which we did for you.
Speaker A:That is behind a little bit of paywall.
Speaker A:But you guys get access to close to 600 episodes of bonus content in varying stages of length.
Speaker A:Special shout out to our current patrons, Rob and CB Charles, you guys are fantastic and we appreciate the topics.
Speaker A:Charles I'm thinking that we can get JJ on the third Avatar movie with movies to start with.
Speaker A:A so you know, just a little throw that up there.
Speaker A:But with that, I'll kick it back to the Great bambino Jack Dunn's baby.
Speaker B:A J.J. that's right.
Speaker B:I will find a way to cheat again if that ends up on another list.
Speaker B:And there with that.
Speaker B:This has been a good month as always.
Speaker B:We appreciate you tuning in.
Speaker B:We'll catch you on the next one.
Speaker B:Cinematica.
