Abyss

Year: 1989

Grade: C+

Country: USA

Director: Cameron

Review

leviathan is the other deep sea film that i remember coming out at the same time. until today i had only seen parts of this film, though i’ve seen leviathan in its entirety. james cameron’s direction keeps this film afloat (pun intended). it’s a bit long and heavy at times and it has the peculiar “close encounters of the third kind” element to it, but it manages to be a decent film anyway. it’s not that i disliked close encounters of the third kind, but the supernatural elements in that film and the abyss aren’t explained well enough for me. this may be a tactic on the part of the filmmakers to avoid the questions of believability or it may be part of the point: aliens are supposed to be mysterious and attempts to explain them will inevitably come up short. to be fair, i guess i’m being hypocritical since 2001 is as oblique as any film about extraterrestrial intelligence, yet i love that film.