Volcanoes of the Deep Sea (2003)

User Rating:

7.1/10   

Director:

Stephen Low

Writers:

Alex Low (writer)
Stephen Low (writer)

Release Date:

14 September 2003 (USA)

Genre:

Short | Documentary

Tagline:

12,000 feet down, life is erupting

Plot:

Alvin, a deep-sea mechanized probe, makes a voyage some 12,000 feet underwater to explore the Azores, a constantly-erupting volcanic rift between Europe and North America. |

Cast

Ed Harris	...	Narrator
Dr. Richard Lutz	...	Himself

Directed by
Stephen Low

Writing credits (in alphabetical order)
Alex Low		writer
Stephen Low		writer

Produced by
Lilly Antonecchia	....	line producer
James Cameron	....	executive producer
Dougal Caron	....	line producer
Alex Low	....	producer
Pietro L. Serapiglia	....	producer

Original Music by
Michel Cusson

Cinematography by
William Reeve

Film Editing by
James Lahti

Sound Department
Michel B. Bordeleau	....	supervising sound editor
Ed Douglas	....	sound effects editor
Denys Dufresne	....	mixing assistant
Gavin Fernandes	....	sound re-recording mixer
Goro Koyama	....	foley artist
Andy Malcolm	....	foley artist
Christopher Miller	....	sound editor
Peter Thilaye	....	supervising sound editor
Jean Christophe Verbert	....	sound re-recording mixer
Don White	....	foley recording mixer

Visual Effects by
Paulina B. Abarca	....	visual effects development producer: Big Bang FX
Sebastien Beaulieu	....	digital artist
Felix Gabriel Bernard	....	digital artist
Pascal Colpron	....	concept/storyboard artist
Patrick Faille	....	digital artist
Carl Gagnon	....	digital artist
Olivier Goulet	....	lead artist
Xavier Lestourneaud	....	digital effects artist
Carlos Monzon	....	digital compositor
Marcin Nikiforuk	....	matte painter
Mario Rachiele	....	visual effects supervisor
Daniel Rapo	....	scanning & film recording
Jean-Pierre Riverin	....	CG artist
Craig Edward Rogers Jr.	....	digital scanning
Craig Edward Rogers Jr.	....	film recording
Frederic Simard	....	digital artist
Antonin Messier Turcotte	....	digital artist
Sebastien Veilleux	....	digital artist
Kim Yong-Kyun	....	head technical director
Kim Yong-Kyun	....	image enhancing specialist
Kim Yong-Kyun	....	lead compositor

Camera and Electrical Department
Francis Hanneman	....	second assistant camera
Andrew Kitzanuk	....	director of photography: second unit
James Matlosz	....	first assistant camera

Editorial Department
Todd Baillere	....	post-production consultant
Erika Drushka	....	assistant editor
Charlie Fuguet	....	post-production consultant
Christopher Loucks	....	post-production consultant: DKP 70mm Inc. (uncredited)

Other crew
Jessica Lukian	....	production assistant
Dr. Richard Lutz	....	science director
Johnathon Reeve	....	production assistant
Ivor Shier	....	helicopter pilot
Pierre Thériault	....	cgi effects supervisor

Distributors

• Image Entertainment (2005) (USA) (DVD)
• La Géode (2004) (France) (theatrical)
• Stephen Low Distribution

Also Known As:

Voyage Into the Abyss (USA) (working title)
Ukendte dybhav, Det (Denmark) [da]

Runtime:

40 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Sound Mix:

Sonix

Trivia:

This film, along with Cosmic Voyage (1996), and Galapagos: The Enchanted Voyage (1999), were shunned by some theaters in the southern US after special interest groups felt that film's references to evolutionary theory were blasphemous.

The most impressive. spectacular, absolutely incredible Imax film ever made.

We went to the New Jersey Liberty Science Center on Thursday for the premiere of the Imax film, Volcanoes of the Deep Sea, a production conceived by Rich Lutz, a Rutgers University marine biologist. For more than a decade, Dr. Lutz has been working thousands of feet under the ocean, studying life unexpectedly discovered in the late 1970s, down in the deepest abysses of the ocean. These hitherto unknown life forms are growing in the most poisonous atmosphere in the world, the area around hypothermal vents--the volcanoes of the deep sea. Scientists now believe that these life forms hold the secret of the origins of life on earth. The scenery is awe-inspiring, never before seen by anyone as it is in the film, since even the researchers have never before been able to flood areas the size of a football field with intense illumination, as director Stephen Low's crew did for the film, by attaching lights to the deep sea explorer Alvin. Animations of the actual volcanic explosions were so good and so well integrated into the film that it was hard to tell if they were real or not. The deep sea creatures themselves are as marvelously bizarre in their appearance as they are in their biology. This is the most impressive, spectacular, absolutely incredible Imax film I've ever seen. Forget The Matrix and Kill Bill. Volcanoes of the Deep Sea is the most thrilling film ever made.