10 Things You Didn’t Know About The Abyss

I would put James Cameron up there as one of the best directors, action movie or otherwise, in my lifetime. The worst part about Cameron is that he takes so long to make a film that he only puts out a couple of movies each decade. Fortunately, given Cameron’s lifelong obsession with the underwater world, we’ve been able to see his visions of all of the deep sea mysteries played out on film. The Abyss was one of the first of his many creative adventures. It was one of the most expensive movies ever made at the time of its release, but it also became a box office flop. The production was marred with problems and controversies, and while the film is looked at differently today, it was not looked at pleasantly at the time. Maybe it’s time for all of us to take another look at the underrated and technologically beautiful The Abyss.

10 Things You Didn’t Know About The Abyss

1. Cast members had to become certified divers for the shoot.

2. Ed Harris almost drowned during an underwater filming scene. He had been holding his breath and signaled for someone to bring him oxygen but the crew member was stuck on a cable. A different guy brought him a regulator but gave it to him upside down, sending water down his throat. A third person realized it and righting the regulator so it would work properly. Ed Harris reportedly broke down and cried afterwards.

3. Ed Harris and Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio really went for it during the resuscitation scene at the end of the film. Ed slapped her and screamed in her face, pounding on her bare chest. Mary stormed off set when she was told that the camera broke halfway during the scene and she refused to do it again.

4. Real oxygenated fluorocarbon fluid was used for the rat fluid breathing scene. Dr. Johannes Kylstra and Dr. Peter Bennett of Duke University came up with the technique and were on set. The only reason that the scene is cut away in the film is because they didn’t want to show the rats defecating all over the place.

5. Many of the cast members refuse to talk about their experiences in this film. Ed Harris has said “I’m not talking about The Abyss and I never will”. Mastrantonio said “The Abyss was a lot of things. Fun is not one of them.” After a scene was filmed in which Ed Harris almost drowned, Harris reportedly punched James Cameron in the face after he found out that he continued filming while he was nearly dying.

6. The crew would spend so much time underwater that they often times had to undergo decompression before resurfacing. James Cameron would reportedly watch dailies through a glass window while decompressing and hanging upside down to relieve the stress from the weight of his helmet on his shoulders.

7. Most of the filming took place in a half-completed underwater nuclear reactor facility in South Carolina. The tanks were filled with 40 ft of water and the water was so heavily chlorinated that it often turned the actors hair green and sometimes white.

8. The scene in which Leo Burmester’s character ‘Catfish’ fires a submachine gun into the pool was done using real ammunition. A camera was put underwater and safety precautions were taken on set.

9. Ed Harris and Michael Biehn also appear together in The Rock. Biehn plays a Navy SEAL in both films but their parts are reversed; Harris is the antagonist in The Rock while Biehn is one of the good guys.

10. The alien water tentacle scene was the first to be filmed so that Industrial Light & Magic would have time to get it right before the end of production. The scene was written so that it could be removed from the movie if they couldn’t get the look of it right. When it was finished, Cameron was very impressed and would later use similar scenes in Terminator 2: Judgement Day.