The road to 4K for James Cameron’s underwater sci-fi epic has been a long one… a REALLY long one. Was it worth the wait, or should it be allowed to drown in a sea of 4K releases?
Backstory:
I first got my hands on a DVD copy of 80s cult classic ‘The Abyss’, back in 2000. A friend of the family was an avid DVD collector and had many U.S releases that weren’t available here at the time, and one of which was ‘The Abyss’, which he allowed me to borrow. Until then, I’d only seen poor quality TV broadcasts of the theatrical version of the film, so this 2-disc special edition blew my mind. The DVD was basically a copy and paste transfer of the 1992 special edition laser disc, which was in the correct aspect ratio, but wasn’t anamorphic. This meant to watch the DVD on a widescreen TV (which didn’t exist in 1992, unless you lived in Japan) you had to zoom the image to fill the 16:9 screen.
Just the chance to watch the special edition of the film though, with an entire sub-plot reinstated (spoilers: an alien-made global tidal wave that threatens to wipe out humanity) was exciting and finally made the film make sense emotionally and from a story-telling perspective. This was the golden age of DVD, and a lot of care and attention was given to the release, with animated menu screens, THX approved picture, Dolby 5.1 surround sound and hours of behind-the-scenes footage.
The 2000 DVD menu screen.
The Movie:
The movie itself is about an underwater drilling team that are re-assigned to help the U.S Navy with a rescue operation, after a nuclear submarine goes down close to an abyssal trench. Manager of the ‘Deep Core’ rig, Bud (Ed Harris) and his team of blue-collar misfits then have to contend with a team of Navy Seals lead by Lt. Coffey (Michael Biehn, in one of his career bests) who are sent to help the drillers. But they have a terrifying hidden motive… to retrieve a nuclear weapon from the downed sub incase topside relations with nearby foreign military forces escalate. The tension is heightened further when crew begin to encounter what they believe may be alien life forms emanating from the abyss itself.
Not to mention the ground-breaking visual and special effects, such as an early CGI ‘water tendril’ which was mind-blowing at the time. It’s almost hard to believe this was only James Cameron’s THIRD directorial outing after ‘The Terminator’ & ‘Aliens’. It all adds up to a thrillingly tense and claustrophobic film that in my opinion, has aged pretty well.
The 4K Release:
And that’s when the last physical release was for this film… the year 2000! For nearly 24 years this film has been at the top of many physical media enthusiasts ‘must get’ list… including my own. It almost took on an mythical/unicorn-like status with fans… a disc that will just never happen! Many believed it would appear on 1080p Blu-ray at some point around the time of the first Avatar film in 2009, but James Cameron and Fox gave no real indication of when to expect it (The same was also true of Cameron’s other cult-classic ‘True Lies’).
So, a few years back when rumours began to circulate that Cameron was going to oversee the 4K transfer of the film for 4K Blu-ray, fans rejoiced! Senior colourist Skip Kimball at EFILM in Hollywood back in 2019 posted to his Instagram that they were on with the colour correction.
The Instagram post that got fans of the films excited.
Yet it would still be another 4 years however until James Cameron officially mentioned at a 2023 4K screening of the film that everything was done, and it would be released in a few months.
So here we are! Was it worth the wait? The short answer… is yes (thank goodness)… “But Arron, I like 4K Blu-ray’s and I haven’t seen this on the shelves at my local HMV!”.
That’s because… you won’t… ever! Earlier this year it was announced that the U.K release of the film had been cancelled because of a particular scene that had caused trouble here.
The infamous scene involves a live rat being submerged in a tub of oxygenated ‘breathing fluid’, which the characters in the film use as a demonstration of a deep dive suit that one of the main characters must wear. The suit was fictional, but the ‘fluorocarbon liquid’ was very real, and the rat is shown for several seconds breathing (and surviving) the ordeal. This led to the BBFC (British Board of Film Classification) at the time having to censor the scene, as their hands were tied by U.K law regarding the abuse of animals.
The infamous rat scene.
The shots were cut from all U.K releases of the film and when it came to Disney (now owners of Fox, who originally produced the film) re-submitting the film to the BBFC, they were asked to remove the shots again… and the studio refused. As much as I disagree with animal’s being mistreated in film, I couldn’t believe we’d come SO close to owning the film, for it to be taken away again. Thankfully however, both 1080p and 4K Blu-ray are region-free formats, meaning I could buy the German version of the 4K release back in March of this year. Phew!
The Picture:
The video for the 4K Blu-ray release is, in a word… fantastic. But let’s be fair, this film has suffered with poor image reproduction for so long, it would be easy to be overly forgiving of any digital interference that may have been employed to get us here. Even the DVD release suffered from digital noise reduction and edge enhancement that took away some of the film grain and sharpness. But considering until now there’s basically been no ‘master’ high-definition version of this film (barring a couple of basic HD transfers that have popped up on streaming platforms) there’s really no contest for how good this looks compared to all other previous releases. Here, the native 4K UHD/2160p resolution image, with Dolby Vision and HDR10, in it’s original 2.39:1 aspect ratio… is an almost reference-quality disc.
The film’s VFX hold up well, despite the jump up in sharpness.
Watching it on my OLED TV was like seeing the film for the first time. That familiar colour pallet of blues, silvers and deep blacks are still there, but everything is dialled to 11. Sets, lighting and overall cinematography is breathtakingly good, with only the merest hint of AI enhancement (something Cameron and co went overboard with on the True Lies and Aliens 4K releases). Film grain is still present (thankfully) and even the visual effects like the alien ships don’t seem to really suffer from being dragged into the high-def age. Overall, the picture is an incredible experience whether you’ve seen the film before or are maybe thinking about checking it out for the first time.
The Audio:
We’re treated here to a Dolby Atmos soundtrack, newly remixed for this release. From the haunting opening choral music and surging brass instrumentals, to subtlety creepy overhead water effects throughout, there’s enough going on to justify this engaging, fun Atmos mix. The score, by Alan Silvestri, is probably one of his least memorable, however the moments it takes over work well in the mix, despite certain elements feeling slightly electronic in nature (because they were).
Do you prefer the theatrical or special edition?
Special Features:
The special features are mostly made up of previous behind-the-scenes and stills seen on prior releases. The documentary “Under Pressure: The Making The Abyss” from the 1992 laserdisc is still a fascinating watch. It’s also accompanied by two new documentaries, “Deep Dive: A Conversation with James Cameron” and “The Legacy of The Abyss”. The three disc box-set also includes the 1080p Blu-ray version of the movie for those who haven’t embraced 4K yet.
Conclusion:
The Abyss on 4K is a great purchase, whether you’ve never seen the film, or you’ve been waiting 23 years like I have, you won’t be disappointed. It’s a shame James Cameron’s other movies suffered so much from early AI interference, but the good far outweighs the bad here. See it on the biggest TV, with the best sound system you can for the fully immersive experience that it is (I wonder where you could find someone to help with that?)
Author: Arron – Marketing
