Review of Abyss, The: Special Edition

Introduction

Everyone should have heard of The Abyss, it was Cameron`s famous follow up to his hugely successful Aliens action film. Appearing in the mid-eighties, it featured the first of some major ground breaking special effects by Industrial Light & Magic which would be closely followed by Terminator 2 (another Cameron film not surprisingly) and the CGI filled summer blockbusters we come to know and love.

It also didn`t make much sense to an awful lot of people who had sat through a riveting 2 hours of tense claustrophobic action, only to be greeted with one of the most unconnected endings in movie history. Of course, we now all know why, in those days if your movie was over 2 hours 10 minutes it just didn`t get shown anywhere. The Abyss was expensive, not getting shown anywhere might have had a worrying impact on its box office takings so huge chunks of the experience were cut.

A few years later, its 1991 and James Cameron is re-editing in all the footage he had to take out of The Abyss for a special edition, or to be more accurate the Directors Cut. Now for the first time since the rather poor quality VHS (mind you, what mass duplicated VHS tape could be described as anything else) version, you can enjoy The Abyss in its full underwater glory complete with all the anti-war messages and character development that had fallen so easily onto the cutting room floor.

Video

Hmmm, start with the positive or go straight to the negative? The former might be a good way to go so here we are, this is an excellent quality print with no noticeable compression problems, excellent saturation, beautiful colours, wonderful detail and all those things you would expect for such a high quality release except...

...its not anamorphic. At this point I really do not care what lame ass reason Fox trumped up for explaining away why they let a two-disc set such as this turn up in letterbox widescreen. All I can do is show my sheer disgust at the fact they did, just like with Titanic before it. I dread to think how few lines actually contain video here, what with it already being a 2.35:1 aspect ratio. Add to this the 3:2 pulldown artifacts and you are talking jaggies all the way.

Fox! Sort your life out ffs!

What you do get, like Titanic, is a good transfer despite of itself. And one of the added features is you can either watch the short original theatrical release version or the extended cut via the wonderful world of seamless branching. This feature is known to shake up a few problem players, but luckily I don`t own any of them, so unfortunately I can`t report on their stability with this.

The other issue with seamless branching is pauses. Whilst clearly my DVD-ROM drive is unlikely to exhibit pauses when jumping between branches, the same is not always true for domestic players such as my ageing Pioneer 505. The extended cut didn`t cause any problems, not even minor ones, as for the theatrical cut that surprisingly was exactly what it says on the tin. Seamless branching is amazingly seamless.

Audio

Considering the impact of the opening, you might expect this to be the first real test of your sound system, but it isn`t. In fact the sub-bass in the opening sequences are rather disappointing. But as the film progresses things get better and better, with the vibrations during the end really making the room move about.

The music is excellent throughout, having also been re-edited to accommodate the additional footage. This is one of Alan Silvestri`s best pieces of work, complimenting both the action scenes and more poignant moments equally well.

Sound effects are great, nothing beats a load of creaking and groaning from an underwater structure. Whilst the separation of the rear surrounds aren`t quite up to par with many recent motion pictures, its excellent none the less. Having only seen this film in the cinema once, its great to finally have the full Dolby Digital sound instead of poor Pro Logic.

Features

The presentation of the two discs are excellent, all with nice 3D rendered sequences and subtle yet still flashy cut scenes between each menu. I would have one criticism with it however, and that`s the quality of the background music, its s***e. To spend so much time on the visuals and then put such a decrepid sounding excuse for audio on top is a bit sad but there we go.

The featurette is nice, but the documentary is far better. Not in the same league as the BBC produced one on The Exorcist but definitely watchable and a great insight into the difficulties and lengths went to make this picture. A must view for anyone who loves the film, you will end up with an incredible respect for the cast, crew and more than anyone else, the fluid breathing rat.

On the first disc is the two versions of the film, plus a subtitle commentary track. Yes that sounds as lame as it actually is, no excuse for actual voices. For real nerd only this I`m afraid, the likes of you and me will get bored pretty quickly. It does fill up some of the unused black space however, due to the non-anamorphic transfer.

The second disc is the real feature heaven. At a first glance most of it appears to be endless galleries, shooting scripts, info on the cast and crew all lovingly littered around a huge 3D world, etc, etc. But there is good stuff to be found if you know where to look, although finding what you want can be difficult at times, especially when its not clear which menu item you have highlighted.

A huge number of visual effects and test reels are there to view, all of interest. The best is a multi-angle version of the pseudopod sequence showing various stages of pre and post production, and the time-lapse building of the Deep Core set. There are a number of hidden teaser trailers on various screens you can find, for things like Aliens. Look for the out of place face hugger.

There is some DVD-ROM material on here too, but who the hell wants to ever both with that? Three games apparently, I`ll stick to Quake. And one thing, maybe I`m going mad, but the menus are anamorphic. Shame about the film huh.

You also get a great booklet with the special edition, for once one worth reading too. It details every chapter with additional footage added, including what this footage is and why it was originally cut from the film or added back into this version. If only all the text inside the 2nd disc was available in hard copy too, reading on a screen can be tiresome and hard on the eyes.

Conclusion

Here we have the excellent fully restored cut of The Abyss, the film as it should be with all the meaning it should have. Okay, so what it boils down to is a action/scifi/romance under water with an anti-war message. But this is also Cameron at his best, showing direction of the level displayed so well in Terminator 2, Aliens and Titanic. The ultimate action movie perfectionist with a class and style unmatched.

The acting is superb without exception, the characters are a brilliant mix of humourous rogues, the sets and underwater sequences are above anything else ever seen even to this day. Ed Harris and Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio are perfect as the dysfunctional couple, whilst Michael Bien does an excellent job as the military man you quickly learn to hate yet despite that makes you feel sorry for him later on in the film.

Add all this to a top notch script, more special features than you can shake a stick at, and your left with a must have DVD. The only real bugbear is its lack of anamorphic video, something Fox should be ashamed of. THX should also shoulder the blame, there are now loads of releases bearing their logo that have far from the best picture possible. THX has become meaningless in today`s DVD world for consumers, something even a disc of this calibre will be hard to fix.

Still, despite the video format issues, its difficult not to recommend such a well constructed and enjoyable DVD. This is a must have for everyones collection.