The San Andreas is strike-slip fault, in which opposing blocks of rocks slide past each other horizontally. A big San Andreas quake can spark fires and other mayhem, but it can't displace water and flood San Francisco. Hough said the movie got one aspect right: The tide suddenly ebbing out signals a tsunami is coming.
At heart, Vera is a loner, the daughter of a bird taxidermist who provided a bleak, unloving childhood, but left her with a cozy house on a hill outside of town. Loneliness is an ongoing theme Vera recognizes it well in the people she interviews and has an uncanny knack for getting them to confide in her.