For most filmmakers, 1989’s The Abyss would offer their best film. For someone as accomplished as James Cameron, it falls closer to middle of the pack.

I may classify The Abyss as a middling film by Cameron’s standards, but it delivers a rather good movie. It also holds up surprisingly well 35 years after its release.

Due to a mysterious encounter with an unknown party, an American nuclear submarine sinks in one of the deepest parts of the ocean. Military forces led by Lt. Hiram Coffey (Michael Biehn) combine with a veteran deep-sea diving team headed by Virgil “Bud” Brigman (Ed Harris) to find the sub and deal with it.

A few complications occur. For one, the corporation that owns the diving operation sends Lindsey Brigman (Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio) as a consultant. Bud’s estranged wife, their personal relationship causes friction.

In addition, Coffey hides a secret about his mission that leads to conflicts with Bud and the others. We also deal with the secret of the parties that interfered with the nuclear sub in the first place and a mix of threats/mishaps.

Your rating of The Abyss may change depending on which version you watch. The 1989 film initially appeared in a roughly 140-minute cut but it was expanded to 171 minutes when a "special edition" laserdisc came out in March 1993.

This version restored some small character moments. Most importantly, however, it reinserted a major subplot that concerned the Non-terrestrial Intelligent beings (NTIs).

The latter addition became crucial. I liked The Abyss in its theatrical cut but found the ending to just kind of collapse, as the last act falls flat.

With the restoration of the aforementioned subplot, the conclusion makes more sense and doesn't cause you to wonder what happened. Don't get me wrong: The Abyss works in its original incarnation. However, the extended cut makes it more satisfying.

A number of Cameron's movies have received the extended treatment, but The Abyss turns into the only one that really benefits from it. While the added footage doesn't make it seem like a whole new film, it certainly creates a much more fulfilling vision.

The heart of the film remains the same in either cut: a believable relationship story between estranged leads Bud and Lindsey. In Cameron films, the action may knock you out, but his films often reach a higher level because of the realistic and compelling human stories behind them.

Yes, the characters can seem somewhat cartoony at times. However, they still display qualities that usually don't appear in action films.

The Abyss lives and dies with Bud and Lindsey, and we accept and embrace their escalating reinterest in/recommitment to each other. It helps that Cameron cast two terrific actors, as in lesser hands, the relationship may not have worked.

As occurs in many Cameron films, the supporting roles tend toward broad characterizations. The crew doesn't come close to matching the heights of the folks found in Aliens - a great example of how a strong cast can overcome cartoony characters - but all of the actors feel decent, and they help the film whereas they could easily have hurt it.

Biehn tries a little too hard to overcome his "good guy" image and be creepy in his role as Coffey. Nonetheless, he's still very good and he makes the part work.

I've watched The Abyss maybe a dozen times over the 35 years, and I must admit that I tire of it sometimes. The film starts off slowly and really takes a long time to get into the heart of things, which concerns Bud and Lindsey's relationship and the deepening threat from the NTIs.

Ultimately, however, all of those parts make the experience worthwhile. I can get a little restless in the early going, but it comes together well and makes for a compelling and rewatchable film.

The Abyss appears in an aspect ratio of approximately 2.35:1 on this Blu-ray Disc. Thanks to some pretty heavy processing, the image became a mixed bag.

Though a more than watchable mixed bag, and one that superficially could look great – and therein stemmed a problem. The scan stripped away grain and used AI to “reimagine” the picture, with an artificial boast in sharpness.

This meant that Abyss looked hyper-defined in ways that wouldn’t have existed on the original film, especially since Cameron used Super 35, a stock that tended to become pretty grainy in low light conditions. Given that the vast majority of the film took place underwater and/or in a submersible, this meant the AI functions frequently added that boost of artificial sharpness.

To be sure, these techniques fare better now than they did, say, 10 years ago. While Abyss stripped away all real grain, it only sporadically showed the “plastic” aura that often accompanies noise-reduction techniques.

Still, the absence of real grain left the movie as oddly non-filmlike. Take the underwater scenes, for instance, as these now lack much of the murkiness they should display.

Abyss seemed too well-defined in ways that meant it rarely felt like a film shot in the late 80s. Now if you want a movie that appears “modern”, then rock on. You get that here.

I’d prefer an Abyss that accurately transfers the film the way it worked in 1989. We don’t get that on this disc.

Though unnaturally sharp much of the time, I saw no issues with jagged edges or moiré effects. Edge haloes remained absent. The disc added a light layer of fake grain and the movie lacked print flaws.

Colors almost always opted for a heavy mix of teal and/or blue. NTIs added purple when they appeared, but otherwise anticipate a strong layer of those hues.

My gut says that Cameron made a movie that already leaned toward that color even bluer for this release, but the end result didn’t seem over the top. The disc replicated the tones as intended by the filmmaker.

Blacks seemed deep and dense, while low-light elements felt smooth and clear. Again, it seemed too smooth and clear given the situations, but at least the image didn’t go too dark or impenetrable.

I found it tough to rate the image because it looked superficially good but acted as an iffy representation of the source. I wound up with a “B-“ as a compromise, though if you dig the “reimagining” of a 35-year-old flick to look more modern, then you’ll clearly like the result more than I did.

On the other hand, the film’s DTS-HD MA 5.1 soundtrack seemed much better than expected for material from a 35-year-old flick. The forward channels provided an image that spread well across the speakers, as it created an effective and lively forward soundstage.

The activity in the rears kept up and added a lot to the action. The channels meshed together in a smooth, satisfying manner that created a vivid impression of the various settings.

Overall quality seemed good. Speech appeared clear and fairly natural, so I had no problems understanding lines even in the most hectic of circumstances.

Effects sounded terrific, with a lack of distortion. The realistic nature of these components added to the impact of the film, as the highly-detailed environment shined.

Alan Silvestri's score also seemed well-reproduced, with clear highs and deep lows. Despite its vintage, the soundteack sounded very good and outdid many new mixes, much less almost anything from the late 1980s.

How did the Blu-ray compare to the DVD from 2000? The BD’s lossless audio sounded fuller and clearer than the DVD’s lossy mix.

A non-anamorphic affair that clearly derived from a 1993 laserdisc scan, the 2000 DVD looked great – on my 36-inch tube TV back then. Once we leapt to bigger widescreen sets, its many flaws became apparent.

As such, the Blu-ray blew the dated DVD out of the water. Even with the flaws I found in the Blu-ray, it proved massively superior to the awful-by-2024-standards DVD.

We find both the 1989 theatrical cut (2:20:16) as well as the 1993 Special Edition (2:51:01). I discuss some of the differences in the body of the review so I’ll not do so again here other than to note that I continue to strongly prefer the longer version.

No extras appear on the movie disc itself, but a second platter provides a collection of materials. A carryover from the 1993 LD and the 2000 DVD, Under Pressure: Making The Abyss brings a terrific 59-minute, 37-second program that details the travails of the creation of the film.

The piece comes from 1992 and includes then-current interviews with writer/director James Cameron, producer Gale Anne Hurd, underwater director of photography Al Giddings, production designer Ron Cobb, director of photography Mikael Salomon, sound mixer Lee Orloff, and actors Ed Harris, Michael Biehn, Kidd Brewer, Leo Burmeister, John Bedford Lloyd, JC Quinn, Kimberly Scott, Adam Nelson, and Todd Graff.

I find a lot to love here, as “Pressure” really does tell a compelling "warts and all" tale. We get a great look at a wide variety of production elements, all told with unusual bluntness.

Two new programs exclusive to the 2024 release ensue, and Deep Dive goes for 32 minutes, 23 seconds. This one offers notes solely from Cameron.

The filmmaker looks at the project’s early roots, influences, sets and locations, filming in water, technological innovations, aspects of the shoot, visual effects, the two versions of the movie and the experience’s impact on Cameron.

Inevitably, a fair amount of content here repeats from “Pressure”, as it covered a lot of ground. Still, Cameron brings enough new info to make the chat worth a look.

The Legacy of The Abyss spans 24 minutes, 39 seconds. It brings remarks from Cameron, Hurd, Lightstorm Entertainment COO Jon Landau, Walt Conti Productions supervisor Walt Conti, Cinefex reporter Don Shay, DreamQuest Images visual effects supervisor Hoyt Yeatman, ILM computer graphics designer John Knoll, Walt Conti Productions electrical designer Ty Boyce, systems manager Charlie Arneson, VFX producer John Bruno, LA surface unit DP Dennis Skotak, LA surface unit VFX supervisor Robert Skotak, and ILM VFX supervisor Dennis Muren.

“Legacy” discusses diving and underwater shots, sets and locations, miniatures, the depiction of NTIs, and visual effects.

An awful lot of “Legacy” feels redundant, as it touches on topics already examined in the prior programs. While enjoyable on its own, “Legacy” simply doesn’t tread upon much new ground.

Archives presents a slew of stillframe materials. It breaks into 29 chapters that mix text, photos, storyboards and concept art.

Those chapters range from a mere two frames of information (“Table of Contents”) up to a whopping 1105 frames (“Writer/Director and Screenplay”). All in all, “Archives” contains 4331 stills.

Note that some of these bits come from subdomains inside the chapters. For example, “Writer/Director and Screenplay” allows viewers to branch into elements such as the final shooting script. You don’t have to examine these, but they’re available.

Some of the chapters also provide video elements. We get footage from the set, demo reels, and trailers, among other elements. The DVD review linked above gets into those with more detail.

These text materials are extensive and detailed, which means they're of most interest to the serious Abyss fans. Face it: casual observers won't care to spend many, many hours wading through all this minutiae. However, if you love this sort of material - as I do - you'll be tremendously entertained.

Note that the Blu-ray doesn’t upgrade the quality from the DVD, so pictures remained less than crisp.

Also note that the Blu-ray drops a vintage featurette and a text commentary from the DVD.

While not James Cameron’s strongest film, The Abyss remains a lively, engrossing adventure. It delivers involving situations and characters as well as plenty of action, all of which turn it into a mostly positive experience. The Blu-ray brings us excellent audio and a ton of detailed supplements along with generally positive but overly processed visuals. I wish Cameron left well enough alone and gave us an Abyss that more accurately represented the film as it appeared 35 years ago, but after 25 years of a terrible DVD, fans will take it.

Note that as of March 2024, this Blu-ray version of The Abyss only comes as part of a package with the film’s 4K UHD edition. Normally I don’t review discs that don’t enjoy solo releases, but given that the film never saw Blu-ray release prior to this set, I suspect plenty of fans will buy the 4K just for this BD so I figured it deserved its own write-up.

To rate this film, visit the original review of THE ABYSS