Waterworld

Tina Majorino

Kevin Costner

Chaim Girafi

Rick Aviles

R.D. Call

Zitto Kazann

Leonardo Cimino

Zakes Mokae

Luke Ka'ili Jr.

Anthony DeMasters

Willy Petrovic

Jack Kehler

Jeanne Tripplehorn

Lanny Flaherty

Robert A. Silverman

Gerard Murphy

Sab Shimono

Rita Zohar

Henry Kapono Ka'aihue

Michael Jeter

August Neves

Tracy Anderson

Dennis Hopper

Neil Giuntoli

Robert Joy

John Fleck

David Finnegan

Greg Goossen

William Preston

Jack Black

John Toles-Bey

Kim Coates

Ari Barak

Chris Douridas

Alexa Jago

Sean Whalen

Robert LaSardo

Lee Arenberg

Doug Spinuzza

Victor Sánchez

Paul Bogh

Hal Douglas

Anne Gaybis

Michael Haddad

Todd Livdahl

Chris Moore

John Otrin

Delisa Sexton

Jenny Tallent

Would water really cover the world like that?

In short... no.Much of the melting would make no difference at all to sea levels. This is because a lot of the ice in the arctic and antarctic is sea ice, ice floes and icebergs floating on water. Most of this is already below the waterline - and the only reason a small percentage of an iceberg sticks out of the water is that ice is a bit less dense than water. As it melted the berg would submerge completely, but the ice would also shrink by the same amount as it turned back into water. So the overall effect on the oceans would be zero, or at least very close to it.What would matter is the ice that is on land melting and that extra water running into the oceans. We don't have a perfect number for how much of this ice there is but we do know it reasonably closely, and if all the ice on land melted it would raise sea levels by around 400 feet.Given that most of the world's population lives within 400 feet of sea level this would certainly be a global catastrophe of unprecedented scale. But it would cover only a small fraction of the total surface. It is shown in a deleted scene that the Dry land they find at the end of the film is the top thousand feet or so of Mount Everest, which would indeed be the last place to flood if the ocean could rise that far. But in reality, a 400 foot sea level rise would leave the world with almost as much dry land as it has today, in percentage terms.To give an example of how far the movie is from reality, consider that it shows the Mariner diving thousands of feet down to explore the sunken city of Denver. In reality a 400 foot sea level rise would leave Denver still almost a mile above sea level, and more than 1,000 miles inland from the coast.

What are the differences between the Theatrical Version and the Extended (TV) Version?

The movie was heavily cut for the Theatrical Version. Years later, American broadcaster ABC aired an reconstructed Extended Version that was running more than 43 minutes longer than the well-known version featuring scenes, that were cut prior to the movie's theatrical release. Later on this version was released on DVD as well. A detailed comparison, split up in 2 parts, between both versions with pictures can be found here (Theatrical <> Extended) and here (Extended <> Theatrical)