On Fire

The fire was done very well, and showed the real dangers of living in the woods and how fire can spread so fast. And with featuring the 911 staffing, showed how quickly things can change when fire spreads from strong winds. What seems couldn't happen becomes what does happen. The weakness is the script, as the actors do a good job showing their skill, their danger and the ability to think quickly. And the father Dave, risked everything for his family. Rated PG-13, it was watered down into too much of a formula driven script. But that is more the reality of what is necessary than the fault of the execution of the production. It needed to be acceptable for family viewing. It seems to be a lot of real fire, along with some CGI fire, but maintained the tension.

No pun intended - I thought at first the movie was made in the 80s - the title and the fact Lance Henriksen is one of the "leads". I was wrong in the end - but I did like what I got served. Well liked as in I think it was very well made. Because what we do get is quite harrowing. And yes suspension of disbelief is quite important here. And accepting that some things may feel a bit like cliches ... but they still work.

I have met Peter Faccinelli at a convention and he seemed very content and happy with the movie. And considering the cast and the struggle/fight for life we see there ... something we can all relate to ... Will of life ... drama baby ... it all works, depending on how much slack you want to cut it.

Oh goodness. Why didn't somebody stop them!

The story in its essence was very good, however the delivery is idiotic. Over directed in the most silly, childish ways; melodrama past any point of sanity, and poorly written so that it loses all sense of reality. In fact, this should have been fantastic because the essence of the survival story is extraordinary, but because the writing is so lacking, and the direction is horrifically childish, over the top and silly, they lost all the power it should have had. They should have studied Ron Howard's Backdraft to understand the power of a "fire" movie and what it could have been, not whatever they looked at as their example.

This was embarrassingly bad, and for no good reason other than too much ego to go hire a real, decent Director, and Writer. Even an excellent Director could have worked with this idiotic script and made it work. It would have been an entirely different film. Sad they didn't do that.

Yet another movie that I had never heard about, "On Fire" from directors Peter Facinelli and Nick Lyon immediately caught my attention when I saw that cover. I am a sucker for natural disaster movies, despite the majority of the movies being questionable. But I had never heard, much less seen, "On Fire" before, so of course I opted to give the movie a chance.

The storyline is pretty straightforward, and I will say that it is a fair enough watchable movie, though hardly anything outstanding. So writers Nick Lyon and Ron Peer didn't really deliver something out of the ordinary here. And yeah, it was essentially also a very predictable and somewhat generic storyline actually. But hey, if you enjoy natural disaster movies, "On Fire" is definitely well-worth sitting down to watch.

There are a couple of familiar faces on the cast list, with the likes of Peter Facinelli (whom also co-directed the movie), Fiona Dourif, Glenn Morshower and of course the iconic Lance Henriksen. So I will say that the the cast ensemble in the movie was definitely good. The acting performances in the movie were good.

Visually then "On Fire" was good. The effects were fair and looked real enough, though I have to admit that I had a hard time buying into the characters ever were in any real danger. And that sort of took away from the overall impression of the movie.

Watchable for what it was, "On Fire" is hardly a movie that warrants a second viewing, as there isn't enough contents to the storyline for that. But it definitely is a movie worth sitting down to watch if you enjoy natural disaster movies.

Ultimately, then the movie's cover/poster over-sold the movie by a landslide. The cover/poster was way more interesting than the movie turned out to be. A sad fact, actually.

My rating of directors Peter Facinelli and Nick Lyon's 2023 movie "On Fire" lands on a five out of ten stars.

Perhaps the best thing about this film is that it will convince many people that it is really necessary to keep those 50 or even 100 meters without trees around the houses. And even then... the example given here of the ingenious care taken by the owner of that house literally going up in smoke was interesting: you're never safe from the recklessness of your neighbors.

The story of a family of 3+1 who survived a forest fire provides the pretext for a production in which we are placed inside the burning forest, in a terrifyingly realistic reconstruction of the scenario that someone in those circumstances has to face - with virtually no chance of survival. Great value is placed on unity, as each element of these three will contribute in its own way to an improbable outcome.

The production (pyrotechnics and everything else) is stupendous, the actors very convincing and the filming impeccable. But there are a few problems, namely the script, which is too formulaic and predictable, and with inconsistencies: there's the manslaughter of two old people, with no culpability and (almost) no remorse, and there's the final shock of seeing those trees, so green, on the shores of Lake Chilton...