The Best Movies You’ve Never Seen podcast – Dead Calm

Episode: Dead Calm

Podcast: Best Movies You’ve Never Seen

Date: 5 June 2026

Hosts: Stephen Fenech & Trevor Long

---

[00:01:43] Stephen Fenech: Hello and welcome one and all to The Best Movies You’ve Never Seen. This is our little podcast where I present some movies to Trevor Long. My name is Stephen Finnick. I’m the movie nerd of the, of the duo here. And, uh, Trev’s never seen many movies until now. He’s building up his vocabulary week for week.. And the idea of the show is for Trevor to watch a movie at my suggestion that he’s never seen before, and perhaps that you’ve never seen before. Perhaps. There’s a lot of, uh, a lot of movies from, uh, this movie we’re doing today, Dead Calm, was released in 1989. So that’s really— that’s a while ago. Wow. Okay, maybe some listeners here that weren’t even born then, right?

[00:02:20] Trevor Long: Okay, I hadn’t dated in my, in my head, so that’s— yeah, that’s fascinating.

[00:02:23] Stephen Fenech: Uh, yeah, released in 1989, Dead Calm, starring Nicole Kidman, a very young Nicole Kidman.

[00:02:28] Trevor Long: Oh yeah.

[00:02:28] Stephen Fenech: Uh, Sam Neill. And Billy Zane, directed by Philip Noyce, a great Aussie director who’d go on to direct some other big blockbusters as well. Now this is a— when you describe this to someone, I’d call this like a horror thriller, like a psychological horror thriller.

[00:02:46] Trevor Long: I don’t know, I look— yeah, I still think horror element, horror loosely, but yeah, certainly a psychological thriller, no doubt.

[00:02:52] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, and it’s, it’s a very— like, there’s only 3 characters in it, right? So it’s very tight.

[00:02:56] Trevor Long: Casting was easy.

[00:02:57] Stephen Fenech: It’s sort of—

[00:02:58] Trevor Long: yeah, it’s really easy.

[00:02:59] Stephen Fenech: Well, I’ve got the 3. I see. So the, the they were literally on the ocean for 95% of the movie. Wow. Filming took almost 6 months. Jesus, it takes a lot. Coordinating on the ocean, I guess, is hard. You heard all the horror stories about films like Jaws and Waterworld, or that when it’s hard to film.

[00:03:19] Trevor Long: Okay, that’s extreme. But you know, staff costs a lot. It’s just 3 cast members.

[00:03:24] Stephen Fenech: That’s it. Uh, this is— was based on a novel There was a novel by Charles Williams called Dead Calm, inspired by the real-life murders of a family on a sailing ketch off Florida’s coast in 1961.

[00:03:39] Trevor Long: Wow.

[00:03:40] Stephen Fenech: So the case involved a— there was a decorated veteran named Julian Harvey who was hired by a family to skipper a boat from Fort Lauderdale to the Bahamas, right? Uh, Harvey’s wife, the veteran’s wife, was also on the boat. Upon returning from the Bahamas, Harvey went on to murder his wife, hoping to collect an insurance policy, and 4 members of the family, of the Duperrault family, who hired him. Um, but he thought one of the— when he went along, killed everyone, thought one of the, uh, the daughters was, uh, had died, but they were asleep below deck. Uh, he scuttled the boat, so sank the boat. Assuming that she would drown. Terry Jo, her name’s Terry Jo. And, uh, he sort of— he got rescued, made up a great story about a storm and him being the sole survivor. But Terry Jo was found alive, brought back to Florida, and when Harvey, the, the guy who did— committed the murders— we found out she was alive, committed suicide.

[00:04:44] Trevor Long: Wow.

[00:04:45] Stephen Fenech: And, uh, Terry Jo made a full recovery.

[00:04:48] Trevor Long: Wow.

[00:04:48] Stephen Fenech: One surviving member of the family.

[00:04:49] Trevor Long: I don’t think she made a full mental recovery.

[00:04:51] Stephen Fenech: Yeah.

[00:04:51] Stephen Fenech: So that’s quite involved, the novel. So they took the sort of the concept of someone—

[00:04:56] Trevor Long: because when you said inspired by, I thought, okay, so it’s just the skippering of the boat and the deaths. But then the actual survival and stuff is— because you’ve taken that as well.

[00:05:04] Stephen Fenech: You got to remember what the Billy Zane character gets up to. So I think that’s pretty much on his side of it. Yeah. They’re inspired by it. Nice. Had you heard of this at all?

[00:05:13] Trevor Long: I’d heard of it.

[00:05:13] Stephen Fenech: Yeah.

[00:05:14] Trevor Long: And I think even, you know, in my pre-this podcast years, I could have named Nicole Kidman as being—

[00:05:20] Stephen Fenech: Yep.

[00:05:20] Trevor Long: This being a movie star.

[00:05:22] Stephen Fenech: Well, the poster, famous poster is her. It’s like a little yacht and the ocean horizon and her face sideways on the horizon. That was the famous poster. Was that your thumbnail?

[00:05:32] Trevor Long: I don’t remember what it was actually. But you know why I don’t think I saw a thumbnail? Because it was arduous to find. You made me watch something on ABC iView for the first time in history.

[00:05:41] Stephen Fenech: Oh, there you have it. Yeah. I knew it was available. I don’t put a show on one platform. I don’t put a show up unless you can.

[00:05:46] Trevor Long: ABC, you made me sign up to the ABC. You owe me.

[00:05:50] Stephen Fenech: Sorry, mate. Well, I had this on, uh, it’s not on 4K yet. I had it on Blu-ray. Okay. Yeah. Um, Steven Spielberg watched this movie and liked Sam Neill so much he cast him in Jurassic Park.

[00:06:02] Trevor Long: Oh wow.

[00:06:02] Stephen Fenech: It was this movie he thought he’d be good, he’d be good for my movie.

[00:06:05] Trevor Long: Oh, that’s awesome. Yeah, yeah, he did, mate. He played a great role. Yeah. Um, you know, he’s a— because you could kind of tell, I mean, I assume She was the junior, you know, this is not, you’ll tell me later, but it’s not a first, it’s a very early movie. And he came with chops, you know, he had a bit of experience there.

[00:06:23] Stephen Fenech: Absolutely, yeah, there was an age difference and I will reveal that later on. Sam Neill also met his wife on this movie, Noriko Watanabe. She was, I think, on the production crew.

[00:06:34] Trevor Long: Well, she was definitely on the production crew because you want her in the movie.

[00:06:37] Stephen Fenech: Exactly. So she was part of the film and that’s where they met.

[00:06:40] Trevor Long: Wow, that’s lovely.

[00:06:41] Stephen Fenech: And still married. Excellent. Righto, this is your last exit before the freeway. If you have not watched Dead Calm, we are gonna really go right out to sea with this one.

[00:06:51] Trevor Long: Aye!

[00:06:51] Stephen Fenech: If you haven’t seen it, you can watch it through Fetch.

[00:06:55] Trevor Long: That’s right, Fetch is your all-in-one entertainment service. And this is a great example. Not every movie is available to rent or buy on any platform, including Fetch. But because Fetch has so many inputs, so yep, you could watch your free-to-air TV, you could watch included TV channels or other subscription channels. You can watch the streaming apps, Netflix, Stan, Disney+, Disney Plus, plus all of the local catch-up apps like NineNow, Seven Plus, Ten, ABC iview, and SBS On Demand. Well, when you do a universal search on your Fetch Box, it’ll show you where these items are. And this one instantly took me to ABC iview. And because I hadn’t used it before, I had to log in, but then it just took me straight into this movie, uh, after I’d logged in. So it was a seamless situation, easy to use, and it means there are 10,000 plus— in fact, 11,000 plus movies to watch. Buy, rent, enjoy on your Fetch Box through either the rental buy or through the subscriptions or free services that you’ve got access to. And it actually exposes you to how much free content there really is out there on, on the internet for you, because a lot of it’s available right there on Fetch. You can buy a Fetch Box from major retailers, get one from Telstra, or you can go to fetchtv.com.au.

First impressions — Brutal opening, Nicole Kidman, Sam Neill

[00:08:07] Stephen Fenech: We have now watched Dead Calm Just give us your first impressions.

[00:08:12] Trevor Long: I, you know, it’s a, it’s a slow burn, but very quick movie, but slow burn and just beautifully done. Like, I love the fact that I don’t know that any of it is truly predictable. You can get a sense of, well, he’s going to go over there, he can get a sense of some things. Yeah, but yeah, I like the fact, I like the fact that it, it keeps you, keeps you guessing a little bit. And, you know, I, I wouldn’t say Nicole Kidman’s Best movie performance. She’s excellent in it, but Sam Neill’s the star of this movie, I think, in terms of acting performance.

[00:08:41] Stephen Fenech: Billy Zane, he was good, the villain.

[00:08:43] Trevor Long: He’s pretty good. I like Sam.

[00:08:44] Stephen Fenech: And what is your social media post?

[00:08:46] Trevor Long: Oh, my social media post for this one, if you just stand by while I bring that up, is, uh, you might have heard of this early Nicole Kidman film Dead Calm, but like me, never seen it. Well, it’s worth a look. A brutal opening leads to a calm on the open water until— and the rest of it you need to see for yourself. Hidden on ABC iview, but it’s worth a watch.

[00:09:03] Stephen Fenech: Very good. I saw this at the movies. I was actually playing for Souths at the time.

[00:09:08] Trevor Long: Yeah.

[00:09:08] Stephen Fenech: And I remember watching this movie one month before I did my ACL. I did my ACL in July ’89. I remember seeing this in the theaters, May, I think early June. Right. And then a month later I’m out with 6 months on my knee. Many rewatches in the meantime. Yeah, I really enjoy this movie. It’s a bit— it’s a— we’ll talk about— thank God I got a big screen later, but it’s a beautiful, very well shot film.

[00:09:32] Trevor Long: Yeah, beautiful.

Cast — Nicole Kidman, Sam Neill, Billy Zane

[00:09:33] Stephen Fenech: Cast, not many. There’s only 3. Nicole Kidman plays Rae Ingram.

[00:09:37] Trevor Long: So where is this in her career?

[00:09:39] Stephen Fenech: Very early. Yeah, she goes on to play Moulin Rouge with Ewan McGregor, Baz Luhrmann’s film.

[00:09:46] Trevor Long: Right.

[00:09:46] Stephen Fenech: I think it’s the 25th anniversary this year, and we are probably not going to do that.

[00:09:52] Trevor Long: No, I’m happy with that.

[00:09:53] Stephen Fenech: Oh yeah, yeah. I tried to watch it, I couldn’t. It was just too cut, cut, cut.

[00:09:58] Trevor Long: Too— That Baz Luhrmann style.

[00:09:59] Stephen Fenech: It was going to give me— if you’re epileptic, don’t watch it.

[00:10:01] Trevor Long: Right, wow.

[00:10:02] Stephen Fenech: It’s really hard to watch. All Baz Luhrmann films like that. Most of them are like that. Nicole Kidman was also one of your favorites, The Others, which we’ve done. Okay, remember that one? Not really.

[00:10:11] Trevor Long: You don’t remember, do you?

[00:10:12] Stephen Fenech: Remember the woman with the two kids in the big house thinking she hears the ghosts?

[00:10:16] Trevor Long: Oh yes.

[00:10:17] Stephen Fenech: Okay, all right, don’t have to rewatch it. It’s a great watch, great listen. Listen to it on our show. Uh, she was also in The Hours. She won a Best Actress Oscar for The Hours. I think she plays an author. Her name doesn’t escape me right now. She was also in Eyes Wide Shut opposite her then-husband Tommy Boy Cruise. And we will do this. This is a Stanley Kubrick movie. It’s a bit out there, but it’s worth a check.

[00:10:44] Trevor Long: I’ve only seen certain scenes.

[00:10:46] Stephen Fenech: I bet you have. Yeah, I bet you have. Sam Neill, your man, plays John Ingram, and he was in, of course, Jurassic Park. He was in The Hunt for Red October, another favorite. Ah, yes, he was.

[00:10:57] Trevor Long: Favorite. You did love that one.

[00:10:59] Stephen Fenech: In my top 5 movies ever. Love that movie. He was also in Evil Angels. He played, you know, that was about the Chamberlains, Lindy Chamberlain. Oh, of course. What’s the husband’s name? Richard Chamberlain, was it Richard Chamberlain? Richard Chamberlain, was it? No, no, that’s an actress. That’s an actress. It’s Michael Chamberlain. His name was Michael. He plays Michael Chamberlain and looks a dead ringer for Michael Chamberlain.

[00:11:18] Trevor Long: Fair dinkum. Yeah, yeah.

[00:11:19] Stephen Fenech: All right. He was also in another movie called Event Horizon, which I’ve seen. It’s a sci-fi slash horror film. It’s, yeah, it’s not bad. Not bad. Billy Zane plays Hughie Warrener, and of course he was in Titanic. That was his, yeah, that’s his, that’s his, the first line of his obituary is he was in Titanic.

[00:11:38] Trevor Long: Right.

[00:11:38] Stephen Fenech: He was also in the Phantom, and it was for fans of the Phantom, uh, which is an international— like, internationally known character. Not quite your Batman, Superman level, but, uh, yeah, the movie was, was good, not great, right? It was, yeah, it was average.

[00:11:57] Trevor Long: Oh wow.

[00:11:58] Stephen Fenech: But you know what, good that they had to go.

[00:12:00] Trevor Long: They gave it a crack.

[00:12:01] Stephen Fenech: Did you also notice Billy Zane in Back to the Future Part II? He was part of Biff’s crew.

[00:12:08] Trevor Long: Oh, is he?

[00:12:09] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, one of the three guys. All right, he was one of those.

[00:12:12] Trevor Long: Okay.

[00:12:12] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, yeah.

[00:12:13] Trevor Long: So next time I see that old mate, he was in the Titanic.

Sponsor — Hisense RGB Mini LED TVs

[00:12:16] Stephen Fenech: There you go. Alrighty, before we get to the top scenes, let us chat about Hisense. And you know what, Hisense, they’ve just released their new mini LED RGB TVs. RGB is their new tech— red, green, and blue. That means that the backlight not only produces the light, but also the color. So brightness and color from the same source and individually controlled. The result is amazingly accurate color and just an improved viewing experience. And the, the UR8 series— they’ve got the UR9, but there’s also the UR8, sort of slightly more affordable, available in sizes from as small as 55-inch all the way up to 85-inch. So this is the brand new 2026 technology at a more affordable price and has all the bells and whistles too. The RGB Mini LED, the Hi View AI engine, the native 180Hz game mode as well. Don’t forget, best screen in the house, you want to play your games. Also has anti-reflection and glare-free, so even if you go for the bigger TVs where there’s likely to be reflections in your bright viewing area, it’s not going to be a distraction at all. And the great thing about the Hisense TV2 is that out of the box it sounds great. 2.1.2 multi-channel sound right out of the box, no need to add a soundbar, it sounds great on its own. So if you are, if you are looking for a new TV to enjoy the movies that we talk about on the show, or your sport, or your games, Hisense has got you covered. Check out their new RGB Mini LED range now at hisense.com.au.

Scene breakdown — The opening tragedy, Saracen on the ocean

[00:13:54] Trevor Long: Okay, now the, the movie, for a movie that’s, it’s all about the water, this opens like I’m watching the wrong show. Like, for a minute there I went, wait, it’s got to start with all the, with all the logging into ABC, I wonder whether I’d actually started the right movie.

[00:14:08] Stephen Fenech: Well, you did start the right movie. Sam Neill is on the train. When he gets off the train, he’s obviously— he’s a Navy captain. Did you notice it says Australian Navy on his— all the other guys, remember? And he’s a captain and they’re saying, oh, you know, Merry Christmas, I think. Well, I wish you a Merry Christmas or something.

[00:14:23] Trevor Long: There’s a lot of that going on. But then there’s two guys that they’re standing there and it’s like, hang on, is he about to be arrested or what’s going on here?

[00:14:29] Stephen Fenech: Two police come up to him, mate. So it’s a rainy night and he’s a Royal Australian Naval Officer. And he’s expected to be greeted by his wife and child. Yep. But he’s instead greeted by two police officers, and he’s told some really bad news.

[00:14:46] Movie Audio: Yes, I did. I’m very sorry, but we’ll need a formal identification. Yes, of course. I have to warn you, most of the injuries were to the face, I’m afraid. The police said that my son died on impact. Is that correct?

[00:15:04] Movie Audio: Not quite.

[00:15:06] Movie Audio: Just after the ambulance arrived. And how long was that? He was unconscious, Captain. He wouldn’t have been aware of any pain. How long, doctor? About 20 minutes.

[00:15:18] Stephen Fenech: So yeah, pretty— uh, and as they’re talking, he walks into the ward where, uh, Ray, his wife, is, and she’s getting reflex testers and, and it’s got all tubes down her throat and everything. And so pretty horrific start.

[00:15:31] Trevor Long: Yeah, mate, brutal. Yeah, because it’s not just that moment there. Then they go through a bunch of flashbacks.

[00:15:37] Stephen Fenech: And yeah, so we see what the incident— which is his wife Ray’s driving the car there, little boy, cute little kid in the back, unbuckles himself, lets himself out. I think he’s— what did he drop, his teddy bear or something? And he’s reaching for it, she gets distracted, boom, crash, head-on crash. The child just goes straight through the windscreen and is killed. Yeah, but the next cut is to the wide open ocean. And to cope with this grief and heal her trauma, they decide to get out on their well-equipped sailing yacht, the Saracen.

[00:16:12] Trevor Long: And you get a sense that this is not just their idea, but so he talks here, I don’t know if it’s specifically in this clip about how this is what they said, it would take time and you’ve gotta heal, you’ve gotta let it happen. And so it’s kind of an interesting way of trying to move on from such a tragedy really.

[00:16:28] Movie Audio: We’ve got weeks and weeks.

[00:16:31] Movie Audio: Calm days, calm seas.

[00:16:34] Movie Audio: And we’re gonna get strong. And when you’re strong, then we’ll go home and we’ll start again.

[00:16:43] Stephen Fenech: Because she was having nightmares and flashbacks, and that’s where we hear him calming her down. Now, my little interjections are going to be called anchors. Okay, anchor here. Now, you’re asking about how old they both were. Yes. At the beginning of production, which was in May 1987, Neil— Sam Neil was 39. Nicole Kidman, how old do you reckon?

[00:17:09] Trevor Long: 21?

[00:17:10] Stephen Fenech: 19.

[00:17:10] Trevor Long: I was gonna say 19.

[00:17:12] Stephen Fenech: She was 19.

[00:17:13] Trevor Long: Yeah, she is super young in this. Like, every shot of her, you kind of go, wow, she is so young.

[00:17:19] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, she is.

[00:17:20] Trevor Long: Wow.

[00:17:21] Stephen Fenech: Anyway, weeks pass, the ocean, uh, becomes, uh, glassy and still, uh, a real dead calm.

[00:17:27] Trevor Long: You get a real sense of the movie title there. Yeah.

[00:17:30] Stephen Fenech: Uh, Ray, still visibly fragile, uh, has has nightmares and he’s taken heavy prescription sedatives.

[00:17:39] Trevor Long: But old mate is constantly on guard. Like he’s basically her carer here. So he hears her go for the pill bottle and she’s shaking them out. He takes a few off her so she’s only taking what she’s meant to be getting and stuff like that.

[00:17:50] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, that’s true. And don’t forget, he’s a naval captain. He’s an officer. So sailing this thing’s like nothing for him.

[00:17:55] Trevor Long: He’s at home here.

[00:17:56] Stephen Fenech: That’s fine.

[00:17:57] Trevor Long: He has no issue with this. He’s probably away at sea most of the year, but it’s her that wants to go home and him that’s, you know, guiding her through the ocean.

Scene breakdown — The Orpheus appears, Huey boards the Saracen

[00:18:04] Stephen Fenech: Now, uh, the silence is broken when John spots a black schooner named the Orpheus drifting on the horizon.

[00:18:14] Trevor Long: Did you know that term before this? Yeah, I did.

[00:18:16] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, come on. I swear I did, mate.

[00:18:17] Trevor Long: It’s a black sailing ship, okay? It’s just like a First Fleet style sailing ship. For people that don’t know what we’re talking about, if you haven’t watched the movie, it’s a First Fleet style sailing ship with masts.

[00:18:26] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, yeah.

[00:18:27] Movie Audio: Black schooner to my east. Black schooner to my east. This is yacht Saracen, Victor Kilo 2762, position Position 1616 south, 17647 west. Do you read me?

[00:18:41] Stephen Fenech: Over.

[00:18:43] Trevor Long: So he’s trying to get in touch.

[00:18:45] Stephen Fenech: It’s what you do. Trying to say, okay, to your east, is everything okay? They, they, there doesn’t seem to be much signs of life, but my other anchor here is that tall ship. Okay, you want to call it a tall ship?

[00:18:54] Trevor Long: There you go, that’s what I’m looking for.

[00:18:55] Stephen Fenech: That was used was the Golden Plover, which is based at Airlie Beach. Really? Near the Barrier Reef.

[00:19:02] Trevor Long: Are you going to tell me later on where this was filmed?

[00:19:04] Stephen Fenech: Near the Whitsundays. It was filmed in the Whitsundays. Really? Yeah. That’s where Dead Calm was filmed, says it here. A full-size model ship was then burned. Remember later on they burned? And Golden Clover is still around today.

[00:19:16] Trevor Long: Oh, ’cause again, one of my questions, that was a really well-done burn scene because it didn’t, it looked real to me. I’m thinking that’s crazy good. But then you like, if it’s a, I wonder how big the model was, like 1/3, 1/8?

[00:19:29] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, I think if they’re full-size, they said full-size model ship. Yep, yep. Burned in the film. That’s all spoiler alert, that happens later.

[00:19:37] Trevor Long: See, that’s the budget I want to know, how much they spend on that.

[00:19:39] Stephen Fenech: I don’t know the budget, but it’s been decent. Yeah, this was, I think, like Hollywood quality Australian film. Oh, sure. You know, like this is an Australian production, but Hollywood quality.

[00:19:48] Trevor Long: Just imagine going, we’ve got this script, you got Philip Noyce, it’s all good, right? It’s coming together. Here’s the budget, we’ve got the cast and the crew, we got this, we’re gonna have a boat, we’re gonna have a spare yacht, whatever. We got boats to go around that one. Also, we’re gonna need a big tall ship. Cool. You can rent that from Airlie Beach. But also we’re gonna need to build another one of them and burn it.

[00:20:07] Stephen Fenech: And set fire to it.

[00:20:07] Trevor Long: And someone’s like, so you want $150,000 to build something you’re gonna burn?

[00:20:12] Stephen Fenech: Like, it looks great, that one, Phil.

[00:20:13] Trevor Long: Mate, you look at that shot and you go, worth whatever they paid.

[00:20:16] Stephen Fenech: That’s the nature of Hollywood, isn’t it? They build something and then—

[00:20:19] Trevor Long: They literally burn money. Yeah, they wreck it.

[00:20:21] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, that’s exactly right. But it’s there forever, mate, on film. That’s right. The deck of the schooner, tall ship, shows no signs of life. Radio calls go unanswered. But as he’s looking through the binoculars, sort of looking at the ship, then he tilts down and there’s a— sees a frantic guy rowing.

[00:20:38] Trevor Long: She thinks she spotted something, so he’s like, okay, let me look, and let me have a look.

[00:20:41] Stephen Fenech: And there’s a guy rowing a dinghy frantically away from the vessel towards them, and like so hard towards them he nearly runs into him.

[00:20:50] Trevor Long: He runs into the yacht.

[00:20:52] Stephen Fenech: He’s like, hang on, crazy. The man we find is an American named Huey Warren. This Billy Zane collapses on the deck of the Saracen in a state of terror.

[00:21:01] Movie Audio: How long have you had the boat?

[00:21:03] Movie Audio: 32 days out. We’re bound for Papeete. I’m heading for Fiji. I only bought her about 3 months ago. My plan had been to cruise around the Pacific, to sail around the Pacific.

[00:21:17] Trevor Long: I mean, who would have thought, right?

[00:21:19] Movie Audio: What’s your trouble, Mr. Werner?

[00:21:21] Trevor Long: Trouble?

[00:21:21] Movie Audio: Trouble that she’s going down, that’s the trouble. She didn’t sheet up on last morning.

[00:21:27] Movie Audio: You sure?

[00:21:29] Movie Audio: Yeah, she opened up all over.

[00:21:32] Movie Audio: How’s the water hit your engine?

[00:21:34] Movie Audio: My engine, radio, the fucking bulkhead, galleys, everything. My only chance was to try to reach you in the dinghy.

[00:21:48] Movie Audio: See what Mr. Warner needs, darling, and, um, get him to bed.

[00:21:55] Movie Audio: Where are you going?

[00:21:58] Movie Audio: Well, um, I ought to get over there. How many people on board?

[00:22:04] Movie Audio: Nobody.

[00:22:04] Movie Audio: I’m alone.

[00:22:05] Movie Audio: I’m it.

[00:22:08] Movie Audio: Trying to take her across the Pacific. Any around?

[00:22:16] Movie Audio: No.

[00:22:17] Movie Audio: There were 6 of us.

[00:22:22] Movie Audio: Yeah, this died 10 days ago. One by one, all happened in a day.

[00:22:33] Trevor Long: Pretty full-on. And by the way, I’m with John, didn’t like him from the get-go.

[00:22:37] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, well, you knew something was up there, and we find out that all 5 of his companions, according to Huey, died, uh, from botulism. Remember he mentioned—

[00:22:48] Trevor Long: I did talk about a canned salmon. Yeah, John again being— sounds like a wise man, suggests it might be botulism.

[00:22:55] Stephen Fenech: So here we go. John, uh, a veteran seaman of 25 years, is like you said, skeptical of Hughie’s hysterical story that everything was ruined by the water.

[00:23:06] Movie Audio: There must be something.

[00:23:10] Movie Audio: Oh, give me a break, Liam. You know what I had to do?

[00:23:14] Movie Audio: I can guess.

[00:23:15] Movie Audio: You can guess? They’ve been dead for days, man. You know what that does to a body, pal?

[00:23:20] Movie Audio: You’ve got to try and stop thinking about it.

[00:23:22] Movie Audio: I mean, I— I can’t go back, all right? I can’t go back there right now, ever.

[00:23:32] Stephen Fenech: So his antennas are way up now.

[00:23:35] Trevor Long: Yeah.

[00:23:35] Stephen Fenech: Yeah. But while Hughie sleeps off his exhaustion below deck, John locks him in the cabin.

[00:23:42] Trevor Long: As I didn’t notice originally that he was locked in. I just, you know, they sent him off to sleep.

[00:23:47] Stephen Fenech: But also too, he finds in his, a little piece of paper. I think he had like something.

[00:23:53] Trevor Long: There’s a bunch of things in there. One of them is a newspaper clipping that I think raises his suspicions.

[00:23:57] Movie Audio: Interesting stuff here. Listen to this. South Sea Island cruise. 4 young women wanted for photo assignment. Must be attractive and broad-minded.

[00:24:12] Movie Audio: You don’t like him, do you?

[00:24:16] Movie Audio: I hadn’t really thought about it.

[00:24:18] Movie Audio: John, imagine what he’s been through.

[00:24:21] Movie Audio: Sorry, Ray, whichever way I turn it, I just can’t swallow it.

[00:24:26] Movie Audio: Any reason?

[00:24:27] Movie Audio: Not really. Just 25 years at sea.

Scene breakdown — John boards the Orpheus, discovers the horror

[00:24:32] Stephen Fenech: So his gut is pretty right, it’s quite spot on. Uh, ignoring Ray’s unease, he decides to jump in Huey’s little dinghy, rows over to the drifting orca, and makes it very clear to Ray to load the gun.

[00:24:45] Trevor Long: That’s how, that’s how nervous he is about this story.

[00:24:47] Stephen Fenech: He says, uh, leaving his— so he’s left Ray alone with their dog Ben, their little doggy.

[00:24:53] Trevor Long: Uh, don’t call him a little doggy, mate, because that gets hard later on.

[00:24:55] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, I know. You never— yeah, anyway, John boards the flooded Orpheus, wading through water, discovers a house of horrors. No evidence of food poisoning. Remember, he opens the door, there’s like red bodies coming out.

[00:25:11] Trevor Long: Yes. Do you know what’s really fascinating about that is, because when you— when they look into that kind of hallway, there’s, there’s 3 doors, one in front, 2 each side. Yeah. And I could see the, the tainted water, the bloody, just, just slightly bloody. Yeah. Coming out of one door. And I thought, hang on a minute, what’s going on here? And then it starts coming out of the other door. And then he opens it up and like, oh, Yeah, it was kind of— and I’m not suggesting I’m psychic, I’m— I just think it’s amazing how they plant little things like that to make it real. Oh yeah, do you know what I mean? Like, absolutely, to, to go, hang on a minute, if there’s bodies in here and people have been killed, there’s going to be blood, so we need to, you know, show that as well.

[00:25:44] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, uh, so yeah, it’s pretty, uh, we’re seeing brutally mutilated and hacked up corpses of the crew. Yeah, and all everyone else. But he manages to restore the boat’s generator. And that triggers a video playback.

[00:25:59] Trevor Long: It kind of brings on the power.

[00:26:00] Stephen Fenech: So the generator’s on.

[00:26:02] Trevor Long: So there was a VHS TV playing.

[00:26:04] Stephen Fenech: Just so happens to be a little tape in there playing, showing basically that what started as a cheerful vacation, topless women and they’re taking photos and you hear the photographer like Hughie’s making suggestions of stronger, saying, mate, shut up and let me.

[00:26:20] Trevor Long: Yeah, it’s like the photographer is like, Hughie, you’re here to drive the boat. Do your job. I’ll take the photos. But Hughie thinks he’s better than the photographer already.

[00:26:28] Stephen Fenech: So, you know, it shows that Hughie’s actually a psycho.

[00:26:32] Trevor Long: Yeah.

[00:26:32] Stephen Fenech: And he suffered, suffered a psychotic break, let’s just say.

[00:26:35] Trevor Long: Let’s call it that.

Scene breakdown — Huey seizes the Saracen, Ray held hostage

[00:26:36] Stephen Fenech: Back on the Saracen, Hughie wakes up, breaks out of his locked cabin, and attacks Ray, knocking her unconscious. Now John’s rowing back at this point in a panic, and he was yelling out, jump off, jump off, to get off the boat, right? But she’s unconscious, and as he’s coming towards it, he tries to jump back on the deck, misses it, and he’s off. The motors are on and he’s off. Yeah. So John rows drives the boat back to the Orpheus and sees—

[00:27:02] Trevor Long: just for that moment, hang on a minute. So we’re in the middle of the Pacific here, right? Yeah. Or we’re in the middle of the ocean with a ship that’s just sinking. You’re like, okay, there’s a big ship there that’s sinking, you’re on a bloody dinghy, and your yacht is now charging someone else’s—

[00:27:16] Stephen Fenech: someone’s direction with your wife on board.

[00:27:17] Trevor Long: Could you imagine the feeling of isolation, even being a seasoned seaman like that? Like, it’s unbelievable.

[00:27:24] Stephen Fenech: It’s— so it’s, it’s set up. So that’s the real sort of plot point that, okay, geez, there’s a situation here.

[00:27:30] Trevor Long: And you know, you know, he’s an experienced sailor. So we’ve got a sense that he’s now going to go back and he’s going to work. So you got that. What I mean by the predictability earlier when I talked about it, like that’s predictable. He’s going to go to the big boat and try to work it out.

[00:27:40] Stephen Fenech: He’s going to go and try to sort it out, which is what he does.

[00:27:41] Trevor Long: But that, that broad, I think the way it positions your mind at this point is great. Yeah.

[00:27:46] Stephen Fenech: Well, he’s left alone literally in the middle of nowhere. Back on. So John rows back to the Orpheus. His boat sailing away. But John gets back on board and he realizes he’s trapped on a dying ship here. There’s no working engine at this point, no sails, a flooded hull, and it’s, uh, going down. But thankfully he’s got his naval engineering skills here. He rigs the bilge pumps, plugs structural leaks, and tries to repair the engine to give chase, knowing he’s in a race against time. He’s got to get this boat working if he’s any hope of following them.

[00:28:23] Trevor Long: That’s right. And I think there’s a bit, there’s a bit here where you go, well, oh mate, and especially if you go with the based on a true story, so We’ve got this, what they call the split narratives too.

[00:28:30] Stephen Fenech: So there’s John and then there’s Ray on the boat.

[00:28:33] Trevor Long: And so you think about that original story this is based on, that the bloke scuttled the ship, right? So you can theorize that the idea here was that old mate had scuttled the ship, but, you know, not quick enough. It hasn’t sunk yet. But John’s smart enough to know, well, a ship is not built to sink easily. You know, there’s different ballast and all those kind of areas. So he’s smart enough to be able to go, okay, how can I try and bring this back? And that physical exertion of him Yeah, you know, pumping the bilge, pumping water out is remarkable. It’s really well done.

[00:29:00] Stephen Fenech: Like, luckily, like, that was you or me, mate, we’d be dead. We’d be, we’d be sinking to the bottom of the ocean.

[00:29:04] Trevor Long: Plenty of those moments.

[00:29:05] Stephen Fenech: He’s a naval engineer, so it’s in his wheelhouse.

[00:29:08] Trevor Long: Though I will say, I think one of the underlying little plot points or stories or thoughts of this movie is just what absolute adversity does to the human character. Because there’s a few moments which we’ll mention where it’s like, exactly, like, this is the end of you, or you need to do this. And there you go.

[00:29:28] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, right. Uh, Wake— uh, Ray’s Wake— woken up on the Saracen and finds herself held hostage.

[00:29:36] Movie Audio: Where is he?

[00:29:37] Stephen Fenech: He’s gone.

[00:29:44] Movie Audio: What have you done to him?

[00:29:46] Movie Audio: Nothing.

[00:29:49] Movie Audio: He went aboard her.

[00:29:53] Movie Audio: We’ve got to go back.

[00:29:55] Movie Audio: Look, he’s only got himself to blame, right? I mean, he should have trusted me. But that’s always been my problem.

[00:30:02] Movie Audio: Don’t you understand?

[00:30:04] Movie Audio: Please don’t shout.

[00:30:06] Movie Audio: As I was saying, that’s always been one of my problems. I can never tell people the real motive.

[00:30:10] Movie Audio: Okay.

[00:30:10] Trevor Long: Too late?

[00:30:11] Movie Audio: Let’s just turn the boat around.

[00:30:17] Movie Audio: Uh, where shall we go?

[00:30:20] Movie Audio: Turn around!

[00:30:21] Movie Audio: Hey, look, you’re being very aggressive, Ray. That could be a real problem on a small boat. I’ve seen it happen before. It doesn’t work.

[00:30:29] Stephen Fenech: So she’s now appealing to his humanity, begging for him to—

[00:30:34] Trevor Long: there is a very quick up and down in there in the way that she reacts to him and treats him. I don’t know that it’s perfectly scripted, if I’m honest, but you get a sense of it’s an evolving story for her, and she’s trying to work out how to deal with with him.

[00:30:47] Movie Audio: I just need to know if that boat is sinking.

[00:30:52] Movie Audio: Sinking?

[00:30:55] Movie Audio: Well, past tense would do, but— oh God, but, uh, yeah, yes, it is. Why, uh, don’t you believe me?

[00:31:04] Movie Audio: Yeah, yeah, I believe you. Of course I do. That’s why we’ve got to go back. Back?

[00:31:11] Movie Audio: Uh-huh, to get John What, you mean back there?

[00:31:14] Movie Audio: Yeah, right now. Uh-huh.

[00:31:18] Movie Audio: No, Ray, no, okay? That’s over. That’s all over. So why don’t we just erase start one from memory and start again, please? There’s no going back, Ray.

[00:31:28] Trevor Long: See, now, spoiler alert, but you’ve watched the movie by now, folks. We’ve given you the last exit. But it’s at this point where I go, babe, I don’t want to break it to you, you’ve got something he would want, so you should probably play on that. I’m literally thinking that at this point. You think so?

[00:31:42] Stephen Fenech: Yeah. Yeah? I’m like, this guy, He’s so emotionally disturbed.

[00:31:46] Trevor Long: Yeah, that he— because you see him basically bipolar, go from being, you know, this, you know, subtle, we’re friends, to this really aggressive. So there’s something there. Honestly, at this point I’m thinking, love, I don’t want to break to you, there’s one way to, you know, capture this bloke.

[00:31:59] Stephen Fenech: One thing’s obvious, uh, he’s totally unhinged. Unhinged.

[00:32:03] Movie Audio: What about those people, huh? There wasn’t any food poisoning. What’s there?

[00:32:17] Movie Audio: You want to do this now?

[00:32:20] Movie Audio: All right.

[00:32:22] Movie Audio: They tried to kill me, Ray.

[00:32:24] Stephen Fenech: They tried to suck the light out of me, if you could possibly grasp that concept.

[00:32:29] Movie Audio: Who were—

[00:32:30] Stephen Fenech: All of them.

[00:32:32] Movie Audio: Look, nobody wants to kill you.

[00:32:36] Stephen Fenech: Repeat that.

[00:32:38] Movie Audio: I said nobody—

[00:32:39] Movie Audio: No, say the words, Ray. Come on. You mean I just imagined it?

[00:32:42] Movie Audio: No.

[00:32:43] Movie Audio: No!

[00:32:44] Movie Audio: No. I just mean that it must be a mistake. Mistake?

[00:32:48] Movie Audio: A mistake, lady? The mistake is that you think I’m making this up!

[00:32:52] Movie Audio: No, no, no, I don’t.

[00:32:54] Movie Audio: You sound so much like them, Ray. It’s scary. Now, they were trying to kill me. Do you understand?

[00:33:01] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, spooky. He’s definitely off the hook there.

[00:33:06] Trevor Long: And the anger, the sheer aggression from him is pretty wild.

[00:33:09] Stephen Fenech: And like you said, he’s gone from 0 to 100 and back again in no time. Instantly. Meanwhile, back on the Orpheus, John is watching the videos of Hughie clashing with his now dead shipmates.

[00:33:20] Trevor Long: So he’s really starting to get a picture of the whole thing. Yeah.

[00:33:22] Stephen Fenech: And he manages to get the engine started and sets a course to catch up with the Sarah Sanderson.

[00:33:27] Trevor Long: Because again, remember, he’s a sailor. He’s plotting points.

[00:33:29] Stephen Fenech: He was drawing lines and writing things down. He looked at the compass, even though the ship ship was just floating.

[00:33:34] Trevor Long: As soon as he got on board, he looked at the compass and the time, and he made those points. I don’t know how you do it. See, that’s the thing where it’s like, if this was you or I, I’d be like, yeah, I don’t know, the sun went up that way. Uh, that’s about as smart as I would be. I’d be like, okay, I need to look where the sun is.

[00:33:47] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, you’re definitely not a seaman, are you, mate? No, me neither.

[00:33:50] Trevor Long: No way.

Scene breakdown — Radio contact, Ray’s plan to drug Huey

[00:33:52] Stephen Fenech: Meanwhile, back on the Saracen, Ray has snuck to the radio and establishes a brief one-way connection with John.

[00:33:58] Trevor Long: Yeah, because he’s sitting on the, on the Orpheus trying to fix things. So he’s again—

[00:34:03] Stephen Fenech: so the radio is on, but he can’t transmit.

[00:34:06] Trevor Long: He doesn’t know, right? Click. He’s just trying to solder eye and fix this thing. But, but I think during this clip he realizes, wait a minute, she can’t hear me, but she can tell that I’m here.

[00:34:17] Movie Audio: Yeah, yeah. I’m not reading you. Is that you, John?

[00:34:27] Trevor Long: One click.

[00:34:30] Stephen Fenech: One for yes, two for no.

[00:34:31] Movie Audio: Are you hurt?

[00:34:32] Movie Audio: You told me you had no trouble.

[00:34:35] Trevor Long: Two clicks, you assume it’s no because he’s not hurt.

[00:34:38] Movie Audio: It’s sinking, isn’t it?

[00:34:39] Trevor Long: I like this because you work it out.

[00:34:43] Movie Audio: So that’s it?

[00:34:45] Stephen Fenech: No, it’s not sinking.

[00:34:47] Movie Audio: You’re not hurt, and no, the boat isn’t sinking. Is that right? Yes. Are you following? Yes. John, what should I do?

[00:35:02] Trevor Long: Yes or no questions only, love. Jesus, what are you doing?

[00:35:07] Movie Audio: Do you want me to stop the boat? Yes. I don’t know how.

[00:35:17] Trevor Long: Sleep with him.

[00:35:21] Movie Audio: Look, don’t worry. I’ll work it out.

[00:35:28] Trevor Long: God, she’s young. She’s so young in this. Her voice.

[00:35:31] Stephen Fenech: In that clip though, I think towards the end, he says, are you sinking? How many hours? Is it 4, 5, 6? And he goes click, click for, he clicks for 6.

[00:35:39] Trevor Long: It would have been easier, by the way, just say click for the number of hours that you, maybe. That would have been a lot easier.

[00:35:43] Stephen Fenech: So what Ray does is go down and stop, get the key. Is that the key?

[00:35:47] Trevor Long: She turns off like a fuel line, then she grabs the key to the engine.

[00:35:49] Stephen Fenech: And it’s got like a wooden paddle on it so it’ll float.

[00:35:52] Trevor Long: She thinks she’s gonna throw it in the water, but.

[00:35:53] Stephen Fenech: She does throw it in the water and the dog gets it. And the dog gets it. And then he goes, come again? Then it was like, who’s the dog going to get back to anyway? Now here’s the part that you like where you—

[00:36:05] Trevor Long: he’s really— she’s really— I’m just saying it’s, it’s a clear path for her.

[00:36:10] Stephen Fenech: Well, look, you know what, let’s, let’s get him in a space a little bit, all right?

[00:36:13] Trevor Long: Like, I think at the time you’re thinking you need to disarm your, your hostage taker.

[00:36:18] Stephen Fenech: If that was, uh, anyone who’s sort of more rational wouldn’t have fallen for it. Like, Hughie’s a nutcase, right?

[00:36:26] Trevor Long: So that’s a good point. He’s a—

[00:36:28] Stephen Fenech: anyway, yeah. So if you’re— if he’s as irrational as him, you would believe that she’s attracted— he would believe that she’s attracted to him.

[00:36:34] Trevor Long: And yes, that’s a good point.

[00:36:36] Stephen Fenech: So she plays into that. Yes. So, and then some.

[00:36:40] Trevor Long: And then so she’s— so maybe she needed that.

[00:36:43] Stephen Fenech: She’s in survival mode still, right? But she’s gonna use her feminine wiles to disarm him.

[00:36:47] Trevor Long: Yeah.

[00:36:47] Stephen Fenech: She acts compliant, feigns attraction.

[00:36:50] Trevor Long: FYI, ladies, will work every time.

[00:36:52] Stephen Fenech: Initiates an intimate encounter.

[00:36:54] Trevor Long: Yes, she does.

[00:36:55] Stephen Fenech: Yes. And here’s my other anchor. Yes. Now, when you’re during this scene where she’s laying on top of him and takes off her shirt and he rips off her shorts. Yeah. He ripped off her shorts for real. You go through his sheer strength. These weren’t cutaway breakaway shorts. He went and from his sheer strength without any alterations to make them easier to rip, he gone whooshka.

[00:37:16] Trevor Long: What a movie fact that you’ve just brought out there, mate. Wow.

[00:37:19] Stephen Fenech: Yeah. And then Nicole Kidman’s full nudeski. Yeah. On top of him there.

[00:37:23] Trevor Long: There you go.

[00:37:23] Stephen Fenech: But then she says, she uses a bathroom break as an excuse to slip away to retrieve a shotgun stored on the deck.

[00:37:31] Trevor Long: Which she hadn’t preloaded or put together. No. This would have been a great time to blow his head off if you’d have preloaded the gun.

[00:37:38] Stephen Fenech: Yeah. Blow it. I didn’t know where we are with the blowing.

[00:37:41] Trevor Long: Okay.

[00:37:41] Stephen Fenech: Righty-o. So, but the plan goes awry though, because her dog Ben follows her onto the deck and starts barking. Yes. And alerts Huey.

[00:37:51] Trevor Long: But she’s smart.

[00:37:52] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, she grabs a pack of cigarettes, she puts it away and grabs the smokes. That’s it. And then returns pretending she just went up for the smoke. To survive, she goes through with having uncomfortable sex with Huey. Afterwards, she prepares him a glass of lemonade heavily spiked with her prescription sedatives. Looks good.

[00:38:17] Movie Audio: Do you want some? No. Oh, come on, you do. Come on, have it. Yeah, now look, do you want it?

[00:38:29] Movie Audio: I want—

[00:38:31] Movie Audio: thank you.

[00:38:33] Stephen Fenech: And he scolds it down.

[00:38:35] Movie Audio: I better go and get dressed. Keep it. Make me another one.

[00:38:42] Stephen Fenech: So Australian she’s sounding, eh? There, don’t you reckon? Well, she’s an Aussie, good luck to her. Yeah, although, you know, you know where she was born? I know, Honolulu. Ah, yeah, she was born in Hawaii. Well, there you go, born in America. So yeah, Huey drinks lemonade, uh, but notices Ray’s suspicious movements just as a big storm hits. Uh, Huey discovers that she’s trying to retrieve the shotgun. Yeah, violent struggle ensues, uh, on the, on the deck. Uh, heavily impaired and drowsy, Huey gets the shotgun but blinded by the drugs, shoots out the radio instead of Ray.

[00:39:19] Trevor Long: Yeah, which is just as bad, to be honest.

Scene breakdown — John escapes the sinking Orpheus, Ray turns back

[00:39:20] Stephen Fenech: Yeah. Meanwhile, back on the Orpheus, which is going down, the storm’s broken the main mast, and the mast has fallen down and blocked the door for his exit on the deck.

[00:39:29] Trevor Long: Remember that?

[00:39:29] Stephen Fenech: Yeah. And he couldn’t get out. He’s thinking, Jesus, trapped down there. So he is now trying to, trying to work your way out there, finds a little piece of pipe so he can still breathe as the water’s—

[00:39:41] Trevor Long: yeah, like he’s trying to hold on to it, but it breaks. And so he realized this pipe could be going to the surface, so he pushes his breath through it to push anything out of it. Fortunately, he didn’t breathe it in because there was cockroaches in it. And then that’s the way he gets air.

[00:39:52] Stephen Fenech: Unbelievable. So he does, though— I remember when he was breathing in his tube, a little fish swims past him and he goes, “Hang on a minute, there must be a hole down here for the fish to get in.” He finds that hole, punches his way out, and boom, gets back to the surface.

[00:40:08] Stephen Fenech: Yeah.

[00:40:08] Stephen Fenech: So what he does though, he’s clinging to a piece of wooden debris in the water and he uses a flare gun to ignite the remaining above water wreckage of the Orpheus. Yeah.

[00:40:21] Trevor Long: Pours petrol, gets it going.

[00:40:23] Stephen Fenech: And it’s up in flames.

[00:40:24] Trevor Long: ‘Cause he’s thinking, well, this is gonna make a lot of fire.

[00:40:27] Stephen Fenech: Yeah.

[00:40:27] Trevor Long: And someone will see. It’s essentially a big flare of its own.

[00:40:30] Stephen Fenech: Big flare, big signal.

[00:40:31] Trevor Long: He doesn’t use a flare gun, he uses a lantern. ‘Cause he pours petrol and then throws a lantern and creates a flare from the boat. He uses a flare gun.

[00:40:38] Stephen Fenech: Later.

[00:40:39] Trevor Long: That’s great.

[00:40:39] Stephen Fenech: Yes, Ray flees below deck, locks herself inside the master bedroom with a spear gun, and he’s firing through the door.

[00:40:47] Trevor Long: Don’t they— doesn’t this, you know, skip ahead a couple of points, but doesn’t this go against your theory that they never heard a killer dog? Yeah, well, because I knew it as soon as she shot— you heard it, you heard it, you know. But as soon as she shot it, I thought she shot the first time, I thought, oh no, don’t keep doing that because and then it happened.

[00:41:08] Stephen Fenech: Well, what establishes it before— do you remember during the film that he can actually put the handle down and he can be that tall? Yeah, yeah. And so when she’s shooting and then you hear a little, little yelp, and then you think, oh shit.

[00:41:20] Trevor Long: Later on they show it. I mean, come on.

[00:41:21] Stephen Fenech: Well, now what happens, she comes out the door and then he pops out at her, and then the door closes behind her. He’s choking her, the door closes behind her, and there he is impaled on the back of the door. Yeah, and yeah, so shocker. But yeah, you don’t normally kill dogs in movies, mate. But yeah, like, you know what, like Fatal Attraction, remember they killed the rabbit? And in this one, the unfortunate, the dog copped it.

[00:41:45] Trevor Long: But yeah, had to be done.

[00:41:47] Stephen Fenech: I’m sorry, not nice. Uh, anyway, as he’s choking her, remember the, uh, he’s got his hands around her neck, but then the drugs really kick in and he’s sort of knocked out. She ties him up, remember, he’s unconscious, she ties him up with with rope, and she turns the Saracen around and braves the— the storm’s getting worse— to sail back to John’s last known coordinates. Yeah. Uh, Hughie wakes up though, using a broken shard of mirror, cuts the bonds and creeps up on Ray at the helm. Yeah. Uh, Ray grabs the harpoon again, shoots him in the shoulder and knocks him overboard. Maybe she, she gets the little, uh, inflatable. Yeah. Pops him on and says, see ya.

[00:42:26] Trevor Long: He’s like, see you later, bro.

[00:42:27] Stephen Fenech: You’re out of here. And then he’s off. Uh, but then she spots the fire. She, she spots the faint glow of flames on the nighttime horizon. She steers the Saracen toward the fire, successfully rescues an exhausted and freezing John from the water. Another anchor here for you: before she filmed the movie, she took sailing lessons.

[00:42:48] Trevor Long: Oh nice.

[00:42:49] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, and, uh, the— she, she knew how to operate the whole thing. Yeah, during that sequence near the end, she is actually piloting the yacht.

[00:42:59] Trevor Long: Really?

[00:43:00] Stephen Fenech: All that time?

[00:43:01] Trevor Long: Good on her.

Scene breakdown — The ending, Huey returns one last time

[00:43:02] Stephen Fenech: So the next morning, the ocean is calm again, and they see the life raft that Ray dumped Hughie into the night before. And they grab a couple of flares and fire it into it, burn it up, and see you later. Yep. Whether he’s in it or not, you don’t know. Well, it’s—

[00:43:17] Trevor Long: yeah, well, you’re walking— I’m like, that’s just like a symbolic thing for her to really just farewell it and say goodbye.

[00:43:22] Stephen Fenech: But it’s—

[00:43:23] Trevor Long: get out. It’s also partly because it’s like, we should check, but He clearly would have sunk to the bottom of the ocean. You know, he would have fallen off because he wasn’t attached.

[00:43:29] Stephen Fenech: You would think that, wouldn’t you? Obviously. So, you know, believing the nightmare is over, Ray sits on the sun-drenched deck. John goes below to prepare breakfast, and he’s shampooing her hair with fresh water, and it’s all lovely.

[00:43:43] Movie Audio: Fresh water? It’s extravagant.

[00:43:48] Movie Audio: No, you want to hear extravagant?

[00:43:50] Movie Audio: Yeah.

[00:43:52] Movie Audio: A steaming hot bath that you can slip into up to your ears with coffee and a croissant.

[00:44:01] Movie Audio: Croissant.

[00:44:04] Movie Audio: Covered in bitter dark marmalade.

[00:44:10] Movie Audio: Oh, and mango. Really, really cold.

[00:44:14] Movie Audio: Now you’re talking.

[00:44:16] Stephen Fenech: So here’s the kettle going off and he wanders off. But I love this, this is a really great shot where she’s sort of reclining with her wet hair and you see these two hands come and start massaging in here.

[00:44:28] Trevor Long: Clearly not John’s because they’re covered in blood, covered in blood and muck.

[00:44:31] Stephen Fenech: And it’s a barely alive Huey, uh, somehow survived the life raft, boarded the boat again. I love the shot too where the camera pans to the side of the deck and there’s a bloody handprint on the side.

[00:44:41] Trevor Long: Did you notice that? You kind of knew He knew it.

[00:44:43] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, of course, from the bloody handprint. And he begins violently strangling her. She’s gasping for air, fighting back frantically. John comes out with— holding her brickie, sees the struggle through the safe like a silhouette. Yeah, yeah. And then he grabs a flare and aims it directly at Huey, and bingo! Not just directly to Huey, he gets him right in the face, gets him in the mouth, and, uh, killing him in a plume of smoke. He drops into the ocean.

[00:45:07] Trevor Long: And it’s a pretty, pretty Hollywood, uh, death there by—

[00:45:10] Stephen Fenech: death by Yeah. So she couldn’t kill him, but he does straight away.

[00:45:14] Trevor Long: Yeah.

[00:45:14] Stephen Fenech: See ya.

[00:45:16] Trevor Long: So he tumbles off. But that is also like a— like the point is she didn’t load the gun because she didn’t have the fear or the distrust of him.

[00:45:24] Stephen Fenech: Yeah.

[00:45:25] Trevor Long: She could have killed him on the first moment if she loaded the gun. But also, does she have that in her?

[00:45:31] Stephen Fenech: Perhaps, John.

[00:45:31] Trevor Long: If it was the other way around and she had have gone—

[00:45:34] Stephen Fenech: Yeah.

[00:45:34] Trevor Long: If she’d have gone off to the boat to check it out and come back and report back to John, we’d be like, mate, why’d you make her row all the way over there? But then if he’d have noticed anything, he would have shot his head off, right? Absolutely. So different story.

[00:45:44] Stephen Fenech: Totally right. Now, John and Ray, they’re battered, but they’ve survived. They’re holding each other tightly as the Saracen sails away on the open horizon. Now, one final anchor here: that ending was, uh, was not the original ending, right? The film originally ending with Ray bashing Hughie in the head with the spear gun and throwing him into the ocean on the inflatable mattress. Yeah, uh, so he’s floating in the distance before turning.

[00:46:16] Trevor Long: The idea was to add the extra bit.

[00:46:18] Stephen Fenech: Well, the last shot of the movie was Ray hugging John and telling him she loved him and that she hadn’t given up hope, so that, you know, she’s back to, you know, she wants to resume her life. Yes, but test audiences weren’t satisfied with Hughie’s ambiguous fate. Is he dead? Is he not dead? And, uh, dead. Well, the implication was Ray had killed him with the blows to the head, so you’re thinking, is he dead or not? No, not proven beyond doubt.

[00:46:45] Trevor Long: He’d also been speared through the shoulder, and that doesn’t last long without medical attention.

[00:46:49] Stephen Fenech: Maybe, but they reshot it. The studio head said, mate, we don’t want audiences spreading bad word of mouth here, we want a better ending. And they re— the one you see ending we saw was a reshoot. They came back and shot it.

[00:47:03] Trevor Long: No wonder it took 6 months. They would have to go back.

Trivia, plot holes, speaker workout & themes

[00:47:05] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, there you go, there you go. Now there’s only— it’s not many much audio in this movie, but there’s one line. I’ve got one favorite line in this one. Uh, remember she was asking, what day is it?

[00:47:15] Movie Audio: What day is it today?

[00:47:17] Movie Audio: I don’t know, Thursday or Friday, one of those days with an R in it.

[00:47:21] Stephen Fenech: One of those days with an R in it. I thought it was funny. Now, uh, how did that happen? A little plot hole here. Um, do you remember when Huey uh, when he comes onto the boat, John rows back to the schooner in his little dinghy. Uh, the rowboat’s visible tied to the schooner, so when he gets off the schooner that’s sinking, he’s sitting on a raft. Why doesn’t he use the robot?

[00:47:45] Trevor Long: I know.

[00:47:46] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, I was thinking, why didn’t he use the robot? Yeah, that’s a question. Anyway, uh, the speaker workout. Now this works two ways here. There’s a lot of parts of this movie where there’s no sound.

[00:47:56] Trevor Long: Yes, absolutely.

[00:47:57] Stephen Fenech: The lack of sound cuts to the come. But also too, like, I think the sounds when he discovers the bodies on the schooner and, uh, yes, the battles on the boat, the sound of the water like rushing out of doors and stuff like that is pretty well done. Very good. If you’ve got a good surround setup, you hear a lot of, you know, a boat makes all sort of creaking noises. Yes, the creaking of the wood. Yeah, you hear that very much, especially on the old schooner. Uh, in, in my theater, it was going everywhere. Um, thank God I got a big screen. Well, how stunning are the ocean shots?

[00:48:25] Trevor Long: It was beautiful, especially the wide ones with not much in it.

[00:48:28] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, I like the aerial shots. Remember there was a couple years ago here and the schooner here and the rowboat in between? It was really nicely done. Yeah, yeah. Okay, the business now. The, the facts here about what do you do if you need to help if someone’s in distress at sea? What are the protocols? So according to international maritime law, the captain of any vessel is legally obligated to render assistance, okay, to anyone at distress, in distress at the sea provided it does not endanger their own ship or crew. Right. So a private yacht rescue, you’d have to recover the guy or the person, raise the alarm, emergency communication. So if you— if once the person’s on board, you’d have to establish, broadcast your position and your situation. And the other bit is first aid and handover. So you’d administer first aid, and then once the— whoever comes out to you, then hand the— hand that person over. That’s assuming that international maritime law— assuming you’re not currently searching for an or anything like that. Yeah, it’s a good— nice one, mate. Uh, if this movie was made today, I don’t think it would be much different. There’d be more advanced gear.

[00:49:41] Trevor Long: Well, I know, I thought the gear was pretty—

[00:49:42] Stephen Fenech: like, it had the radar on everything.

[00:49:44] Trevor Long: So I reckon they’d have SATCOMs or something, but the same thing, all you need is one gunshot. Yeah, no, that’s dead to kill it, right?

[00:49:51] Stephen Fenech: If you remade it, like, she’d have a satellite phone and he’d have different—

[00:49:54] Trevor Long: knock it out of a hand or something, or smash it or something.

[00:49:56] Stephen Fenech: Exactly. Yeah, every day is a school day. What’s our lesson here? Don’t let people on your boat.

[00:50:02] Trevor Long: Yeah, especially ones that are aggressively rowing towards you and bashing into you. Like, it just— yeah, that whole moment was like, mate, you just stop off, just relax, sit down, relax, pal.

[00:50:11] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, yeah. But you know, that’s the whole thing about, you know, it’s dealing with— she’s— don’t forget, she’s grieving grief.

[00:50:18] Trevor Long: And one way to get over the grief of your dead child is to go through another horrific incident.

[00:50:23] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, well, Jesus. Well, they were mean. They were looking to emotion, to ice isolate themselves both physically and emotionally. They want to be alone. So yeah, civilization versus isolation. Uh, would you go sort of masculinity, sort of control, masculine control, trying— him trying to take over?

[00:50:41] Trevor Long: Yeah, there’s a bit— lots of things to explore. The other, the other thing is, you know, maybe trust your partner’s gut instinct.

[00:50:47] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, trust your partner. Trust the guy. He’s a sailor, for God’s sake. Trust him.

[00:50:51] Trevor Long: Load the gun.

[00:50:52] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, exactly. Yeah, that’s the theme, load the gun. Best use of the pause button. Now, did you notice at the start he’s writing his position? He’s 16 degrees 16 minutes south, 176 degrees 47 minutes west. Uh, that would have put the Saracen in the South Pacific Islands of Tonga. Okay, the 65 nautical miles southwest of the Tongan island of Ua, 350 miles east of the island of Fiji.

[00:51:18] Trevor Long: There you go.

[00:51:19] Stephen Fenech: Both, uh, on the South Sea Island Cruises, uh, and Huey’s South Sea Island Cruise pamphlet and story are true.

[00:51:26] Trevor Long: Ah, right.

[00:51:27] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, so South Seas.

[00:51:28] Trevor Long: Nice.

[00:51:29] Stephen Fenech: Uh, also, did you notice if you pause it when she’s looking, she’s loading the gun— I’m not a gun guy, right, so I trust this research here— when she’s loading the gun, the shotgun shells are missing their primers. So if a shotgun shell’s been shot, the primer is still there. So when she’s loading in those, none of those primers there, they were empty shells. So if you look closely, if you’re a gun person, you would have noticed that, right? All right, uh, things you might not know, uh, in a 2021 interview on Mark Maron’s podcast, Sam Neill said that at the start he was very uncomfortable over the fact that he was playing a couple with Nicole Kidman even though he was twice her age. Yeah, he was a bit uncomfortable.

[00:52:12] Trevor Long: It’s a A bit weird.

[00:52:13] Stephen Fenech: Yeah. Um, the other thing you might not know, uh, Philip Noyce directed most of the film, but the secondary, you know, the Sam Neill part, George Miller directed. Wow. Yeah, so he stepped in and he was the— all the bits of him trapped on the vessel were there. There was a scene filmed in which a shark bursts into the half-submerged vessel, uh, forcing Neill’s character to fight for his life, but it was deleted, um, according to Miller, uh, lost to all time. I deleted that scene.

[00:52:47] Trevor Long: Wow.

[00:52:47] Stephen Fenech: And I looked on the disc, I don’t think there is a deleted scenes. I’ll check. Uh, did you notice, I think I’ve already mentioned this, the shotgun, the primers aren’t there. That was, uh, that was it. Uh, what’s the meme? Is there a meme here?

[00:53:00] Trevor Long: Load the shotgun is all I can think of.

[00:53:02] Stephen Fenech: I think, well, I, I I have— I think her preparing the drink. You have my drink, I know you want it. Washing— I think the shot of her, the hands washing the hair. Gonna wash that guy right out of my head. Yeah, maybe that one.

[00:53:17] Trevor Long: There’s probably something in the row, him, his brutal rowing at the start, you know. Yeah, yeah, he’s coming for you or something.

[00:53:22] Stephen Fenech: Competing for the time trial Olympics. Yeah. By Any Other Name. No, I love this. Dead Carving, great name. The only suggestions I had was was open sea.

[00:53:31] Trevor Long: Yeah, or ocean, or high seas. Just call it ocean, on the ocean, or something.

[00:53:35] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, Dead Calm, Sebasta, you could call it. You can’t improve on that.

[00:53:38] Trevor Long: Good grief.

[00:53:39] Stephen Fenech: Good grief, what?

[00:53:40] Trevor Long: I don’t know.

[00:53:41] Stephen Fenech: No, he’s grieving. That’s, that sucks. Uh, the one thing you want— I’ll take the boat, the yacht, obviously. Yeah, uh, I’ll take the harpoon that she had that she fired at him.

[00:53:51] Trevor Long: Oh, that’s brutal.

[00:53:52] Stephen Fenech: Um, the flare gun, the flares.

[00:53:54] Trevor Long: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[00:53:55] Stephen Fenech: And the bottle.

[00:53:57] Trevor Long: Ah, some of— I’d like some of the maps or something, you know, they’d look really nice framed.

Three questions for Trev, ratings & next week

[00:54:01] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, don’t you think? Yeah, not bad. Right, 3 questions for Trev.

[00:54:04] Trevor Long: Okay, hit me.

[00:54:05] Stephen Fenech: What happens to Ray and John now? What’s the next—

[00:54:08] Trevor Long: if they get back to— they get back to life and, uh, have another kid? Oh yeah, that’s, that’s always a— I don’t know, I couldn’t answer that question.

[00:54:15] Stephen Fenech: I think they get back, get it on, she’s pregnant, 9 and a half months later there’s a new baby.

[00:54:20] Trevor Long: I think it’s a lot longer than that. It’s a girl.

[00:54:22] Stephen Fenech: Okay. Yeah. Question 2: do you think they report what happened or keep it a secret?

[00:54:34] Trevor Long: He reports it. He’s an Australian naval officer. Yes, he’s a naval officer. He would document it.

[00:54:39] Stephen Fenech: I reckon no. I reckon let’s keep this between us, no one will ever know.

[00:54:43] Trevor Long: No, because he’s thinking of the families of the other people that were lost on the boats.

[00:54:47] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, maybe.

[00:54:47] Trevor Long: He’s got as much information as he can from reading everything he can. He writes it all down.

[00:54:51] Stephen Fenech: All right, you’ve changed my mind.

[00:54:53] Trevor Long: There you go.

[00:54:53] Stephen Fenech: There you go. Righto, question 3: sequel, prequel, or just leave it alone?

[00:54:58] Trevor Long: I mean, you could definitely sequel it because what do they do and what happens next? But you could just— the problem with the sequel is it’s like, well, A, you could only sequel it if you don’t, if you don’t have that last extra scene because then you go, he’s actually alive and he comes back to try and kill him because they are reporting it like that. The only way you sequel this is by—

[00:55:14] Stephen Fenech: is this him sailing off and you think, is he dead? Is he not? Correct. Okay, right.

[00:55:18] Trevor Long: Yeah, fair enough. Because put it this way, at no point did I think he wasn’t dead. He’s dead. He was in the raft. Yeah, I just don’t—

[00:55:25] Movie Audio: he’s—

[00:55:25] Trevor Long: it’s a dead body. I just don’t want it on the boat.

[00:55:27] Stephen Fenech: Well, I— even the first time I saw it, I think he’s not dead. He’s in that. And you know what, what, what sort of compounded— I’m thinking he’s not dead. Then when they see the raft again, I’m thinking, oh, hang on. But then they shoot the thing and think, oh, he’s definitely dead. Now, right? So it’s like a double twist there. Yeah. And then he comes back.

[00:55:45] Trevor Long: But yeah, you could definitely have frozen this in time and not had the extra ending, and you could have made it—

[00:55:49] Stephen Fenech: maybe, maybe.

[00:55:51] Trevor Long: But any sequel is going to end in some sort of weird— you know, you know it’s a weird twist coming. So I don’t know, I keep it—

[00:55:56] Stephen Fenech: leave it alone, leave it alone, leave it alone. Why not? That is Dead Calm. Give us your wrap-up and rating.

[00:56:01] Trevor Long: I mean, it’s a very good movie. I really enjoyed it. She’s so young in this. Like, just listening to her voice back is crazy. She’s 19. Um, but you know, she’s excellent in it.

[00:56:11] Stephen Fenech: I don’t—

[00:56:11] Trevor Long: yeah, like, I don’t think she’s amazing. I don’t— I don’t know how something like this leads to a Hollywood career. I thought it was excellent. But yeah, it’s an interesting one. Um, but yeah, good story. Nice— nicely broadly unpredictable. Um, 7.5.

[00:56:27] Stephen Fenech: Okay, it’s an 8 for me. Okay, I’m an 8. Um, yeah, so what are you?

[00:56:32] Trevor Long: 7.5. I’m an 8.

[00:56:34] Stephen Fenech: Okay, let’s talk about next week.

[00:56:35] Trevor Long: Let’s do it.

[00:56:36] Stephen Fenech: We are watching Wayne’s World.

[00:56:38] Trevor Long: Schwing! Schwing! Oi!

[00:56:40] Stephen Fenech: Starring Mike Myers and Dana Carvey.

[00:56:44] Trevor Long: You have, ladies and gentlemen, I’m not that much of an idiot.

[00:56:47] Stephen Fenech: All right, well, if you—

[00:56:48] Trevor Long: what year was this made, do you know? 1992. Yeah, so I’m in year 11.

[00:56:52] Stephen Fenech: So in your prime. Yeah, I’m like prime audience.

[00:56:54] Trevor Long: I’m like with my mates who love The 12th Man. Like, this is, yeah, okay, comedy gold.

[00:56:59] Stephen Fenech: So you saw this at the movies?

[00:57:00] Trevor Long: I don’t know that I saw at the movies. Wow, that’s a first. Maybe, I don’t know, it’s a— I guess maybe I would.

[00:57:04] Stephen Fenech: Is it the first movie you’ve ever saw at the movies?

[00:57:06] Trevor Long: I don’t know, I don’t think so, no.

[00:57:08] Stephen Fenech: Um, do you remember the first movie at all?

[00:57:10] Trevor Long: Well, I definitely remember going to the movies in Griffith, so that’s year 7 to 10, right? Because I remember there being intermission and ice creams.

[00:57:17] Stephen Fenech: Yeah.

[00:57:18] Trevor Long: Wow.

[00:57:18] Stephen Fenech: Anyway, uh, right, I’m across it. Mick, Mike Myers, Dana Carvey, uh, what was Wayne’s World based on? Was it A, a book A, a play. C, a comedy sketch. Or D, a cartoon.

[00:57:33] Trevor Long: I’m going to call comedy sketch Saturday Night Live. Yeah, correct, it is.

[00:57:36] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, that’s an easy one. Yeah, because they’re on Saturday Night Live, Saturday Night Sketch, even in the films produced by Lorne Michaels, who’s the boss of Saturday Night Live.

[00:57:46] Trevor Long: Yeah. So, okay, well, you got it easy.

[00:57:48] Stephen Fenech: That was an easy one.

[00:57:49] Trevor Long: Easy one. I can’t wait.

[00:57:50] Stephen Fenech: I gave you an easy one. All right, well, next week’s Wayne Wayne’s World, but we’re glad you enjoyed Dead Camp.

[00:57:58] Trevor Long: Party time! Excellent!

[00:58:00] Stephen Fenech: All right, that’s next week, mate, but I’m glad you enjoyed Dead Camp. See you next week.

[00:58:04] Trevor Long: See you next week.