Underwater Cinema Secrets

Plus: Peacemaker 2 Trailer, Brad Pitt's breakthrough, and The Matrix low tech special effects.

Author

Brock Swinson
May 07, 2025

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Read time: 2 minutes | 421 words

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FEATURE

🎬 Underwater Cinema's Next Wave

$40 million gamble. 230 underwater scenes. Tom Cruise's next frontier.

In 2025, underwater cinematography enters uncharted depths. Ian Seabrook's work on "Last Breath" establishes a new standard for authenticity that even Tom Cruise aims to surpass.

THE SEABROOK METHOD

"Last Breath" cinematographer Ian Seabrook (our interview here) brings decades of diving expertise to Woody Harrelson's North Sea thriller:

  • REAL commercial diving gear—"None of it was movie props"

  • FUNCTIONAL air supply systems at genuine 40-foot depths

  • DOCUMENTARY approach to lighting the pitch-black ocean

The result? A claustrophobic nightmare where a diver's severed "umbilical" leaves him with only "38 minutes of bailout air" in the vast darkness.

"All the equipment was real. The actors had to know that when they signed on... you're going to be relying on the surface tender to be giving you that air."

- Ian Seabrook

THE UNDERWATER LINEAGE

Seabrook's work builds on a storied tradition:

THUNDERBALL (1965): The James Bond classic that pioneered the "10-minute underwater battle" without modern tools. Seabrook admires how "the choreography of that entire sequence... was done without video playback or monitors."

THE ABYSS (1989): Cameron's technical marvel with its massive "deep core rig" that "was much more vast than the set we had."

THE SHAPE OF WATER (2017): Del Toro's poetic approach to underwater imagery as metaphor rather than mere spectacle.

MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE – THE NEXT EVOLUTION

What comes next? Tom Cruise's ambitious underwater sequence in "Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning."

Cruise reveals his aquatic obsession spans four decades: "I have been studying and filming underwater sequences for over 40 years. We have always tried to push our filmmaking to the next level…"

The promise? "An underwater sequence unlike any other."

THE FUTURE BENEATH THE SURFACE

Will Cruise's sequence eclipse Seabrook's authentic approach? The difference may lie in spectacle versus realism.

While "Last Breath" embraced documentary-style immersion—finding drama in the stark reality of commercial diving—Cruise's signature style suggests scale and spectacular stunts.

As Seabrook explains about the underwater filmmaker's mindset:

"There's a certain point with which you need to shut off your diving skills a little bit and concentrate on what you're photographing or what you're filming."

- Ian Seabrook

In this new wave of underwater cinema, authenticity reigns supreme. From Seabrook's raw realism to Cruise's promised spectacle, today's filmmakers understand what audiences demand: genuine immersion that makes us hold our breath along with the characters on screen.

PUNCHLINES