Starring Ed Harris, Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, Michael Biehn, Leo Burmeister, Todd Graff, J.C. Quinn, Kimberly Scott, John Bedford Lloyd, and some other very moist people.
Written and directed by The King of the World.
Synopsis: The most accurate diving film ever made (which still leaves it fairly inaccurate) -- but it's preachy and LONG.
Not just the answer to the question "what did H.R.H. James Cameron do between 'Aliens' and 'Terminator 2: Judgment Day'", "The Abyss" is actually a film about diving. And aliens. And nuclear proliferation. And relationships. But mostly about diving. Is it good? Well.... the answer to that depends on how you feel about diving, and aliens, and relationships, and nuclear proliferation, and... diving.
One fine day in the middle of the Caribbean the USS Montana, an Ohio-class nuclear missile sub, was cruising along peacefully in the middle of an undersea canyon, minding its own business. Suddenly, a strange sonar signal started tracking it. The signal was fast -- very, very fast. Too fast to be a US submarine. So either the Russkies had a racecar of an underwater vehicle on their hands, or something strange was afoot at the Circle K. The unknown contact sped right past the sub, which lost power as the contact passed. Unfortunately, that brief power loss caused the sub to slam into the side of the underwater canyon, rapidly causing it to sink. Oops.
Fast forward to a little bit later, when the Navy is strong-arming an outfit called Benthic Petroleum into allowing the use of their underwater drilling rig as a staging area for a rescue/analysis of the downed sub. The rig is mobile, already at the 1000-foot depth of the sub's wreck, and fully staffed. Hence, it's the perfect choice for the mission. The Navy sends down a team of SEALs to actually run the operation, headed by a lieutenant named Coffey (Biehn).
Also along for the ride, since someone has to bring the SEALs down to the rig, is the rig's designer, Lindsey Brigman (Mastrantonio). Lindsey also happens to be the estranged wife of the 'captain' of the rig, Virgil "Bud" Brigman (Harris). She is an Upwardly Mobile Career Woman, and Bud's just a Grease Monkey. Hence, they're at odds with each other. Lindsey is also apparently a "bitch", per the comments of Bud's crew.
The rig is moved to the site of the wreck, which is explored. During the exploration, the divers see some strange things. Odd things happen, too. Coffey is convinced that the Russians are trying to sabotage their efforts. Everyone else is just puzzled. Coffey is also starting to show signs of suffering from compression sickness, brought on by the fierce atmospheric pressure of a 1000-foot deep saturation diving operation. This syndrome means he's slowly going nuts. Which wouldn't be a bad thing necessarily, except he's in charge, is armed, and has orders to retrieve a nuclear warhead from the sub and blow everything up if there's a risk of the sub falling into enemy hands.
That's when things get really strange for our crew, because the odd happenings turn out to be definitely non-Communist. In fact, Lindsey suspects that there are actually aliens at the bottom of the 3.5-mile deep trench they're near. Oh, there's also a hurricane blowing on the surface, and the US and Soviets are on the brink of war over the whole sub thing. Wacky hijinks ensue. (tm) and (c).
There's a lot of diving in this film. And when there isn't diving, there's submersible driving. And sometimes ROV piloting. Occasional flooding as well. Large waves make an appearance, as do unfathomable depths. It's fair to say that there's a general nautical feel to this film. So if you don't like water, stay away. Stay far away. But having said that, I applaud KotW for actually paying attention to reality with the diving and such. Many filmmakers wouldn't bother to actually have everyone do real diving, or film the bulk of the picture in the massive unfinished reactor core (which is a big, big, big pool of water) of a nuclear plant. A lot of people would have just put everyone in SCUBA gear, even though only one -- ONE -- person has ever made an open-circuit SCUBA dive below 1000 feet. But not you, O King. You did it right -- well, almost right. Every significant technical aspect of the diving in this film is absolutely correct, except for one change that was made for an obvious reason. In real life, a saturation diving station at 1000 feet would use a "trimix" air mixture composed mainly of helium. Hence, everyone breathing that air would sound like Mickey Mouse. I'll give you that one, your highness. Nobody would be able to stand that for very long. Everything else? Dead on.
What there isn't a lot of in this film is story. Yes, there's a nominal plot, but it's thin. Stuff happens, people react, more stuff happens. For THREE HOURS. Some of the stuff is fun, but..... Thankfully, there's plenty of diving to break the monotony. It doesn't help that the movie (or more specifically the aliens) becomes extremely preachy at the end, in a somewhat hamfisted way. Nor does King Jim's writing -- to him, "characterization" apparently means "having one character explicitly tell us the backstory and personality of another character" instead of "actors create impressions in the viewer via acting" -- improve things. (In fact, Ed Harris has almost completely disowned this film, apparently because he felt that he was prohibited from acting by the diving, the effects, and the script.) In almost 180 minutes, the film generates MAYBE 10-15 minutes of actual tension, and probably another 10-15 minutes of action. That's a bad ratio.
The characters are mainly cardboard cutouts, so it's virtually impossible for the actors to breathe much life into them. Lindsey is a bitch because we're told she's a bitch, not because she actually does anything bitchy. (Mastrantonio is just too pretty and wholesome-looking to be an effective bitch in any case.) Bud spends most of his time yelling and/or saving the rig from being catastrophically destroyed. The ROV operator Hippy (Graff), is clearly a derivative of Bill Paxton's character in "Aliens". At least he's entertaining.
A word about Michael Biehn. I've become convinced that Biehn is, in fact, insane in real life. Why do I say that? Because he acts nuts in every role he plays (oddly enough, he's nuts in this film as well), and that freakin' look in his eyes.... I mean, he makes Gary Busey look normal and well-adjusted. Having now written this confession, I fully expect Michael Biehn to bash down my door and strangle me with my own esophagus while smeared in goat's blood and Jello chocolate pudding. Perhaps he'd be singing a Carpenters song at the time. Or maybe Captain and Tenille. Why? Because Mike just seems like that kind of guy. Lite 70s pop/rock and ritualistic satanic pudding slaying. Yep, that's Michael Biehn to me.
But back to the film. All in all, "The Abyss" is by far the worst script, and one of the worst films, that Cameron has created. But I still like it. Why? Because the story, while thin and preachy, is at least coherent and consistent. It isn't bad, it's just weak. Biehn is nuts, but he's always interesting when he's nuts. I LIKE the diving -- it's something you just don't see in any other film; at least not with this level of realism. The aliens are kind of neat (albeit preachy, as mentioned). The film just has...a lot of character, if not substantive quality. That counts for something. It's way, way too long (especially the "special edition" version), but not all that bad, truth be told.
Heck, even King Jim's crap is pretty good.
6.5/10