MovieChat Forums > The War (1994) Discussion > Question about the Water Tower

Question about the Water Tower

posted 14 years ago by Xeokym
10 replies | jump to latest

I don't understand how the water tower worked, or what the purpose of it was. I watched this movie with my family and don't get me wrong, we all enjoyed it very much. But I'm a real stickler when it comes to unexplained discrepancies in movies, and the whole water tower thing bugged me. We all discussed it between us and none of us could come up with any explanation of what, exactly, is going on with the water tower.

Traditionally, water towers like that existed to supply a town with water. They usually were on a high point so the water ran down to the homes below. It would last some time and then need to be refilled, and the water could be pumped from the ground (or sometimes a truck) back up into the tower with a generator. But since this one is obviously getting its water from the quarry, which is full of surface & rain water, it isn't clean enough to be considered consumable water, so it must have some other use, possibly providing a farm with water for the crops. Even so, though, why does the water tower seem to be on some kind of timer?! Where is the water going when it "flushes" out, and WHY and HOW, does it immediately refill?! It's obviously falling apart, so why does the refill mechanism continue to work? And speaking of the refill mechanism, it would HAVE to be hooked up to some sort of generator, to pump the water up the cliffs into the water tower from the quarry in the first place. Water certainly can't get uphill on its own. I don't SEE or HEAR a generator, so how is the water getting up there?!

If anyone has any theories or better yet, definite answers, please fill me in, because my family continues to talk about and debate this aspect of the movie and we have not been able to come to any conclusions on our own, other than it was just meant to be "scary" and they didn't bother showing how it worked since it was just bull-dinkies, and "just a movie." I'm leaning toward it being the "just a movie" explanation, since any water tower in that bad of shape would not be in any functioning condition in the first place, and it only does that "flushing" thing to make it more scary for the movie...otherwise it'd just remain empty.
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I can't understand your crazy moon language.

[–] 14 years ago

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[–] 14 years ago

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[–] rob-949 12 years ago

I don't think the quarry/tower is connected to the marble mine where Costner has his accident. They say it's a couple counties over and he has to drive 50 miles a day or something.

[–] rrjustron 12 years ago

I caught that too, rob, about traveling 50 miles to work but after the cavein his family seemed to get there real fast with no appearent means of transportation: prehaps the 50 miles refered to was how far they had to drive to get his union card.
The existence of the water tower baffles me too, there doesnt seem to be any use for it except for a devise to make the movie a bit more interesting, one more thing, isn't that older kid a bit too old to be hanging arond with such little kids?

Never depend on anything and you will never be disappointed.

[–] webmaster13 14 years ago

I believe that most water towers work based on the siphon effect whereas the tower itself only needs to be filled once. Thereafter, the water that drains from the tower creates suction which draws more water back up into the tower.

[–] PenTheater 12 years ago

No water has to be pumped up into a tower.
But it is cheaper to pump water up to a tank then to apply constant pressure on water so it can flow through miles of pipes to get to faucets and fire hydrants.
Gravity at work there.

[–] crockett_john 11 years ago

As I was watching the movie, I was thinking the water tower was there to supply the quarry with water when it was in operation.

As to how the tower actually worked, I have no idea. It appeared to always be draining, when it was shown from the inside, but I don't think we ever see water coming out of it from the outside and I don't remember if there was a pipe running down the middle of it to take it away somewhere.

I think it's like someone else said, "It's a movie," which I hate to use as an explanation, but I think that's the case. When they have the race to swim to the other side, it makes sense that someone could have turned a huge valve somewhere to make it drain, but when Billy falls in the tower, that wouldn't make any sense to do. I think it's just a dramatic tool you're not supposed to question so much.

[–] Nihilistic4254 10 years ago

I still don't think we have a clear answer on this either. While still scary, that's relieving the water tower has nothing more volatile than a drainage. When looking at the whirl pool, I was wondering if there were pumps at the bottom, which could crush people falling in there. That would hurt and SUCK, and be scary to go through! Drowning there is pretty much the same thing, because the water is so cold and it keeps you down there.

If you played Half Life, it definitely contains a dark and mysterious water you jump into that DOES have a big *beep* machine that can kill you. That *beep* scares me like this past dream I had of just being in dark waters.

While I can imagine people being that crazy to swim in the tower, mainly because of the acting and how we all succumb to some odd perspective we are in the movie with them, I can't see myself believing I can swim stronger than the current. Unlike Stu, I'd swim along the side and catch the end. I mean those waters may be mysterious like something scary-but-non deadly to make you monstrous in attitude, but that drainage surely isn't a giant *beep* made of minerals that simply spits you out so you can swim to safety.

[–] Xeokym 10 years ago

A lot of good speculation!

»«ëÕ|{¥(V)
I can't understand your crazy moon language.

[–] lexyladyjax 8 years ago

Water towers are for storage and gravity feed of water for a local source. The water is usually pumped up to the tower and then supplied as needed from there. In this case it was likely used for mining purposes at the quarry. Water is used to keep dust of drilling/mining down in rock quarrying and that's what this operation appears to be, a stone quarry.

Other water tower use is for a for steam engine. There was no sign of track in the scenes in the film but that doesn't mean there were no cars. We weren't shown the entire site.

AFA the drain, some towers have them. Each.tower has a maximum load of water it can hold and store. It's like the autoflush on your toilet bowl. When it reaches a critical point, down the pan it goes.

Bored now.