Inferno

Not again! A disaster/panic film taking place in West Coast US...What has LA done to deserve all these tragedies? Probably a lot. I had made a vow not to see this kind of movies since Volcano (1997). I don't know what got into my head...Volcano at least had some loud special effects which you could enjoy. This one doesn't even have that. As for the moral lessons, well forget it. Even a ten year old would laugh at it. You'll rather enjoy a re-run episode from The Simpsons.

The film beginning is fairly good considering its a pretty standard TV disaster movie, however once things start to be fleshed out it rapidly becomes overwhelmed by characters and subplots that do more and more to distract from the movies positives ultimately leading to enough mismatches to flesh out 2 or even 3 different films...but which squeezed in to one just distracts and detracts from the enjoyment.

Watxch out for the stereotypes from the standard liberal but tough schoolteacher and the requisite gang banging brother of a dead gang member, a disgraced because he tried to do the right thing doctor and the lifeguard he befriends - who just happens to be the ex of the mad tow truck driver...etc etc...and apparently there was some army guys too...

Such is the poorly setup melodrama and the way the story concentrates more on these characters than the almost forgotten disaster of the impending 60c+ heatwave that any potential edge of the seat tension and drama is smoothed over and its difficult to even say there was any.

The question of who dies,who survives and how/why doesn't even come in to it by the end as there's too many by the book twists to put any flesh on the bones of any individuals or plots. I simply sat and watched each mini- story as a separate as there was no real immersive interplay or connection even when the characters had some supposed back story. Just mentally tick or cross them off as they go because in most cases you never seem to want to care enough to do more than count them in and count them out again. ... Surprisingly I did find Inferno quite likable, if rather forgettable, despite the lack of depth and annoying characters and multiple subplots. For a TV movie it fills the time effectively enough, however it just doesn't do enough to warrant a rewatching in a hurry.

Overall the SF was decent for its genre/budget - outside of the weird space fireball shots. The plot was driven along with enough energy to prevent sleep, though not enough to set the heart racing either. Characters, scenes and dialogue were very mixed and this is where the movie loses points, especially the way some characters seemed to be shoehorned in to the plot but without any redeemable features (The tow truck duo - I'm pointing at you!)

Overall this could have been polished up and had a reasonable score and with one or two less characters and subplots it may have made it...but no, I'm afraid as it stands:

5/10...

I actually watched this movie mainly because a very good friend of mine was in it (Daniel von Bargen as Gen. Craig Maxwell). However, I actually did enjoy the film. I walked into my pub just as it was starting, looked up, saw him, and ended up watching the whole thing over a couple of brews.

For avid sci-fi readers out there, I'm almost positive this movie is loosely based on an old sci-fi short story that I've seen in two separate collections I own. The name, however, evades me. For a TV movie, it wasn't bad. ***xx (three stars out of five)

This is a made for TV disaster movie created by people who apparently don't have a thought in their heads not put there by other Hollywood disaster movies. Not content with producing something utterly devoid of creativity, they decided to throw in a ton of miserable melodrama, overacting, and unlikable characters to boot.

We begin with some solar flares or something, which makes Los Angeles really hot. A bunch of military types gather in a room and recite fabulous lines like "Have you ever been in a war before? Well, this is a war." Suitably impressed, we then get into the sappy personal interest stories.

There's a teacher who's entire life revolves (to the point of mild insanity) around reforming a gang member. The gang member basically hates the teacher, and once the disaster sets in, he and his fellow gang bangers turn a couple of blocks of LA into a war zone. Oh yes, it's easy to see why we should share the teacher's concern for this person. This whole subplot plays out like some sort of Hollywood cultural awareness sensitivity training seminar.

After this, we've got a couple of tow truck drivers, one a stupid, sleazy male and the other an opportunistic, sleazy female. The male is in love with a lifeguard, who goes on her own subplot with a doctor who lost his license because he was too compassionate and kind and sensitive and generally nausea inducing to practice medicine in a hospital run by an evil HMO. The lifeguard turns, magically, into a professional nurse halfway through so she can work together with the doctor to save the previously mentioned gang banger (as the teacher donates his own blood to save him, and yells "you've got to do something!" as the heart monitor flatlines). Meanwhile, the sleazy female tow truck driver cooks up a plan to rob a bank.

She walks into a military base and walks out with a howitzer. She flips someone a salute, and that fools everyone into thinking that she's in the military and has permission to enter the base. The sleazy male tow truck driver torches the lock off the gate of the military base without anyone noticing, then lights his cigarette with the torch. Once he gets his share of the bank robbery money, he kidnaps the lifeguard/nurse and takes her back to his sewer.

Etcetera. There's some more crap with the military, but it's too awful to get into (It involves the teacher character).

Stephanie Niznik looks terrific, though her character isn't very likable, but she says all her crappy lines with that deliciously deep voice of hers. And she sweats a lot. Kathryn Morris steals the show as the sleazy tow truck driver, the only likable character and the only one who rises above being a compilation of clichés. Everyone else is a cardboard cutout in comparison to her character.

INFERNO starts off with a fairly impressive for a TVM starscape effect . We`re also introduced to a scientist who`s called Heller . Don`t you get it ? Heller , Hell-er , Inferno . So I guess someone on the production had some intelligence . However it does become more and more obvious as the TVM progresses that intelligence has been discarded throughout the storyline in order to appeal to an American TVM audience

The story itself is overwhelmed by subplots featuring umpteen stock TVM characters like the tough liberal schoolteacher who`s trying to save a home boy from a life of crime , the doctor who`s lost his medical licence etc . In fact the story concentrates far more on these characters than the approaching disaster that all the potential tension and drama the scenario might have had soon goes up in a puff of smoke , and being a TVM we just know that there won`t be a downbeat ending

There is an onscreen problem I noticed and that is everytime there`s an explosion there`s a massive fireball which looks ridiculous not to mention physically impossible . Look at the scene where the national guard are in a fight with a gang . A soldier fires a grenade into a tower block and the whole building explodes in a fire ball . What a small greanade containing no more than a few ounces of high explosive can do that ! No it can`t . There`s also another scene of army engineers blowing up a dam with plastic explosive and the same fireball effect is seen . Can directors please note that high explosive is not the same as napalm

Having said that I did find INFERNO highly watchable for a TVM and at no time did I find myself wanting to turn it off . It did have some potential and let me repeat the special effects are fairly good considering the budget and it`s not as bad a TVM as some people are making out