The Quake - Das große Beben

First thing you notice is the wonderful natural light and cinematography. But once your eyes adjust, you realize how poorly written this is. You can't believe your eyes. The first hour crawls along with the lead character, silent and anguished, making you wonder what's he so disturbed about and why aren't we allowed into his mind, more than just a hint. After the hour is over, you watch in disbelief as characters act in irrational ways that make you sit in astonishment as believability is thrown out the window to accommodate a weak script. The final 50 minutes try to make up for the first part's inadequacies but by then, you're no longer involved. Is this merely a money-grubbing exercise or are the principles just not very good at their craft? The Wave was so much better.

The prequel of this movie was The Wave (Bolgen) and was slightly better than The Quake (Skjelvet), but I still rate it the same because there are some moments of suspense towards the end even though it were also those same moments that were annoying at some point. Annoying because of the characters having a little chat or emotional moments while the only thing they had to think about was trying to escape death and disaster. It just didn't make any sense and therefor it brings the ratings down. The actors were the same as in The Wave but again I thought they did a better job in the prequel, maybe due to the story telling this time. But if you like disaster movies it's worth watching once. To me it could have been much better if there were more disastrous moments and lesser emotional moments. When you fight for your life there is just no time for sentiments.

A few years ago, the film The Wave came out and became a big success in Norway. The same people have now made this and the same actors and characters are still here. The films are both catastrophe films, but the action is now moved to the capital Oslo. The title indicates well what is going to happen here? Unlike other movies in this genre, this attempts to convey feelings and a story about a family in dissolution. Pretty successful too, the protagonists manage to get a drama out of the situation they are in and their lives. Everything is clearly building up to the event as well as what we are going to see, namely the quake. The effects are good and perfectly done. Good sequences. The movie may be a bit of a hassle before it gets any action, but I can still recommend this movie to those who like this genre.

A movie about folks yelling "Julia!" the entire time, with a little bit of an earthquake mixed in.

This Norwegian movie is a follow up to the 2015 disaster film "The Wave". Kristoffer Joner is back as geologist Kristian Eikjord , some three years after a tsunami disaster in Geiranger, Norway claimed 248 lives and for which he was considered a hero for saving many people.

However, Kristian is suffering from severe trauma and depression, directly related to that disaster. He has even separated himself from his wife Idun (Ane Dahl Torp) and his two children.

Kristian, via a colleague's death, begins to realize there could be another disaster, a major earthquake, about to strike Oslo. As other reviewers have mentioned, the build-up to the disaster is extremely slow and is filled with lots of melodrama and overacting.

It's only in the final third of the movie that things pick up dramatically with some high tension and truly horrific scenes worthy of a disaster flick. Overall, if one can have the patience to stick with this movie I believe it's worth a watch.