VOLCANO
A film review by Christopher Null
Copyright 1997 Christopher Null
O, there's nothing like a natural disaster to bring people together! That's the poorly masked theme ("They all look the same!") behind VOLCANO, the first really big disaster movie we've seen since, gosh, mid-February. It least this VOLCANO doesn't blow -- figuratively speaking -- like DANTE'S PEAK did, and that's mainly because it's so much more fun to watch Los Angeles be decimated by unceasing lava flow instead of a puny Pacific Northwest village. Co-stars Anne Heche and Tommy Lee Jones prove more than able at evading not only the encroaching magma, but also the horde of bad actors that follow them throughout the movie. And while the film is full of creeping cheese, complete with death-defying leaps to safety, slow motion shots, and kitschy one-liners, I shock myself even by saying that, for the most part, it feels *real.* They even thought to include Dennis Woodruff's infamous car, the cheesiest of Hollywood landmarks, floating along in a river of fire. Where else would they think of that!? I really do love L.A...
RATING: ***1/2
|------------------------------|
\ ***** Perfection \
\ **** Good, memorable film \
\ *** Average, hits and misses \
\ ** Sub-par on many levels \
\ * Unquestionably awful \
|------------------------------|
-Christopher Null / null@poboxes.com / Writer-Producer -Visit the Movie Emporium at http://www.filmcritic.com -and Null Set Productions at http://www.filmcritic.com/nullset.htm
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