Deep Blue Sea is a 1999 science fiction horror film directed by Renny Harlin and written by Duncan Kennedy, Donna Powers, and Wayne Powers. It stars Thomas Jane, Saffron Burrows, Samuel L. Jackson, Michael Rapaport and LL Cool J. The film follows a team of scientists in an isolated underwater facility who are researching the brains of mako sharks to help fight Alzheimer's, only for the sharks to go on a rampage after two of the scientists, Susan McAlester and Jim Whitlock, genetically enhance their intelligence in secret.
An international co-production between the United States and Mexico, Deep Blue Sea represented a test for Harlin, who had not made a commercially successful film since Cliffhanger (1993). The film was primarily shot at Fox Baja Studios in Rosarito, where the production team constructed sets above the large water tanks that had been built for James Cameron's Titanic (1997). Although the film features some shots of real sharks, most of the sharks were either animatronic or computer-generated. Trevor Rabin composed the score, while co-star LL Cool J contributed the songs "Deepest Bluest (Shark's Fin)" and "Say What" to the soundtrack.
Released by Warner Bros. on July 28, 1999, Deep Blue Sea received generally mixed reviews; some praised its suspense, pacing, and action sequences, but criticized its unoriginality and B-movie conventions. Retrospective reviews have evaluated the film much more positively. It grossed $165 million worldwide on a budget of $60–82 million. The film spawned a franchise of the same name, and was followed by the direct-to-video sequels Deep Blue Sea 2 (2018) and Deep Blue Sea 3 (2020).
Plot
In a remote underwater facility, doctors Susan McAlester and Jim Whitlock are conducting research on mako sharks to find a cure for Alzheimer's disease, by harvesting a specific protein complex from the shark's enlarged brain tissue to help in the reactivation of dormant human brain cells. After one of the sharks escapes the facility and attempts to attack a boat full of young adults, financial backers send corporate executive Russell Franklin to investigate the facility.
Susan and Jim prove their research is working by testing a specific protein complex isolated from the brain tissue of their largest shark, which suddenly bites off Jim's arm upon awakening in the laboratory. Tower operator Brenda Kerns calls a helicopter that flies through heavy rain and strong winds to evacuate Jim. As Jim is being airlifted on a stretcher, the cable jams, and he is dropped into the shark pen. The largest shark grabs the stretcher, which is still attached to the cable, and uses it to pull the helicopter into the tower; the resulting explosions kill Brenda and the helicopter pilots while severely damaging the facility.
Susan, Russell, shark wrangler Carter Blake, marine biologist Janice Higgins, and engineer Tom Scoggins witness the shark smash Jim's stretcher against the laboratory's main window and shatter it, drowning Jim and flooding the facility. They go to the facility's wet porch, where they plan to take a submersible to the surface. Susan confesses that she and Jim genetically engineered the sharks to increase their brain size as they were not naturally large enough to harvest sufficient amounts of the protein complex, breaking protocol and making the sharks much smarter and deadlier. In the flooded kitchen, cook Sherman "Preacher" Dudley hides in the oven from a stray shark that eats his pet parrot. The shark accidentally causes a gas leak from the oven while trying to break into it, and Preacher sneaks away and kills it by setting off an explosion with his lighter. When the group reaches the wet porch, they discover that the submersible has been damaged and is unsuitable for use. While delivering a monologue emphasizing the need for group unity, Russell is dragged into the submersible pool by the largest shark and devoured. The remaining crew opts to climb up the elevator shaft at the risk of destabilizing the pool. As they climb, explosive tremors cause the ladder to break. Janice loses her grip and falls into the water. Despite Carter's attempt to save her, a shark drags her under and devours her.
The rest of the group moves on and encounters Preacher. Carter and Tom go to the flooded laboratory to activate a control panel that drains a stairway to the surface, while Susan heads to her room to collect her research materials. Carter and Tom reach the control panel, but the largest shark storms in, rips Tom apart, and damages the controls. In her room, Susan encounters another shark and electrocutes it with a power cable, accepting that she had to destroy her research in the process. Carter, Susan, and Preacher regroup and go to a decompression chamber. They swim to the surface while using oxygen tanks to bait the last shark into an attack. Upon reaching the surface, Preacher is grabbed by the shark and suffers injuries to his leg, but the shark releases him when he stabs it in the eye with his crucifix necklace. Carter realizes that the sharks have been manipulating them to methodically flood the facility so that they can ram their way through the fences at the surface and escape into the world.
To keep the final shark from escaping, the three make a plan to blow it up by shooting it with a harpoon and connecting the harpoon's wire to a battery, sending a massive electric current to an explosive charge in the harpoon. Feeling guilty over causing the entire situation, Susan uses herself as bait without telling the others, cutting her hand before diving into the water. She distracts the shark with her blood, but is unable to get out of the water in time and is devoured, despite Carter's efforts to save her. Carter grabs onto the shark's dorsal fin, and Preacher shoots it with the harpoon, which accidentally pierces Carter's thigh and pins him to the shark. Carter nevertheless orders Preacher to connect the wire to the battery, and manages to free himself mere seconds before the shark rams through the fence, where it explodes as it tries to escape. Carter resurfaces and swims to shore, reuniting with Preacher. Moments later, as they sit on the edge, they see a rescue boat approaching the sinking facility. Preacher wryly advises Carter to stop dangling his legs in the water, which he immediately does.
Cast Thomas Jane as Carter Blake Saffron Burrows as Dr. Susan McAlester LL Cool J as Sherman "Preacher" Dudley Jacqueline McKenzie as Janice "Jan" Higgins Michael Rapaport as Tom "Scoggs" Scoggins Stellan Skarsgård as Dr. Jim Whitlock Samuel L. Jackson as Russell Franklin Aida Turturro as Brenda Kerns Valente Rodriguez as Co-Pilot Eyal Podell as Boy Erinn Bartlett as Girl Ronny Cox as Executive (uncredited) Renny Harlin as Worker (uncredited)
Production Development Deep Blue Sea was conceived by Australian screenwriter Duncan Kennedy after he witnessed a "horrific" shark attack on a beach near his home, causing a recurring nightmare in which he was "in a passageway with sharks that could read [his] mind". This motivated him to write a spec script, acknowledging the challenge of approaching a shark film without repeating Steven Spielberg's Jaws. Although Warner Bros. Pictures bought the script in late 1994, actual development on the project did not start until two years later. When Finnish director Renny Harlin was chosen to direct the film, Kennedy's screenplay (which had already been re-written by several writers at Warner Bros.) was presented to Donna Powers and Wayne Powers, who turned it into the film's final script. According to Wayne, "The movie became essentially what we wrote. The draft we were first presented by [Warner Bros.] was much more of a military espionage, high-tech action movie, grenade launchers, that kind of thing. We wanted our team to include more blue-collar types and not to have weapons to fight back, to play it more as a horror film."
In an August 2021 interview with Bloody Disgusting, Kennedy stated that when he initially researched the project, scientists "agreed to talk because [he] presented [the] sharks as man-made, unlike Jaws which demonized natural sharks". He revealed that the original title was Deep Red before he changed it to Deep Blue Sea. He described his own rewrites and those of many subsequent writers, emphasizing a "DBS team effort" and that "all of these writers made contributions that are identifiable in the final film". In terms of the final product, he stated that despite major changes, "development overall stuck within the basic story framework seen in [his] original drafts" and that the final film is "very different on multiple levels [but] also in a more generalized sense... not that different". He confirmed that the development timeline of the project "was in fact under three years, [which is] nothing in Hollywood development time" with the original screenplay selling in late July 1995 and production commencing in early August 1998 for a July 1999 release date. He revealed that as production approached, he "helped to brainstorm ideas for sequences that weren't working" and that the film's producer Akiva Goldsman did uncredited final rewrites on the film. He said that he felt "the decision to steer just a little closer to Alien in multiple ways somewhat limited the film from breaking out even bigger at the box office [...] smart sharks in 'our world' made the movie fresh, but being a little too Alien-esque overall maybe held it back". However, he concluded that the final film "was very much the movie [he'd] envisioned in terms of the visuals, the world, the story journey and the audience experience".
Deep Blue Sea had a budget of $6082 million and represented a test for Renny Harlin, who had not made a commercially successful film since Cliffhanger in 1993. Harlin's main goal was to bring the horror genre back to the serious and high-budget production values of films like The Exorcist, Jaws and The Shining, as opposed to the tongue-in-cheek style of subsequent films in the genre. Alien was an influence on the casting process, as Harlin wanted to cast the characters in a way as to make it impossible for the audience to know who was going to die or survive. To achieve this, he combined relatively unknown actors who could deliver solid performances and meet the physical demands of the diving and stunts with an established star such as Samuel L. Jackson, who "anchors the whole piece". Harlin also forced the studio into hiring rapper LL Cool J as Preacher Dudley because he wanted a character who could bring "a lot of warmth and humor to the film" without making outright jokes.
Filming Principal photography for Deep Blue Sea began on August 3, 1998. Most of the film was shot at Fox Baja Studios in Rosarito, where the production team constructed sets above the large water tanks that had been built for James Cameron's 1997 film Titanic. Some of the sets were designed so that they could be submerged, while others were built on sound stages with fishtanks used as windows. At Fox Baja Studios, the cast worked with sharks that were either animatronic or computer-generated. As the shark used in Jaws was 25 feet long, Harlin decided to increase their animatronic shark to 26 feet. Jackson recalled, "When they first brought it into the lab, we were all in awe of the size of this machine. It was a real monster. I would walk up to it slowly and touch it, and they said it felt like a real shark. The gills moved, and it had a mind of its own sometimes." As an added homage, the license plate pulled from the shark's teeth by Carter Blake (Thomas Jane) is the same one found in the tiger shark's carcass in Jaws. Three 15-foot animatronics were also used to represent the first-generation mako sharks.