Disaster Zone: Volcano in New York

Its kind of a cross between "Volcano" and "Armageddeon". A volcano erupts in a major city and the fate of millions lies in the hands of a team of ditch-diggers. This movie was just plain awful, even for a Sci-Fi movie. The special effects were pathetic and the acting was even worse. The very plot of the movie is lost on me and the movie is just impossible. I am a huge fan of B-movies and I am very entertained by some of the worst movies of all time. This movie, however, is just plain stupid. I expected more out of Michal Ironsides (Starship Troopers) and Alexandria Paul. The cast was decent, but the plot, special FX and acting were terrible.

Someone should write a book on how to make a Sci-Fi original movie. And Disaster Zone: Volcano in New York could be chapter one.

First question to the film makers: there were two fairly good Hollywood volcano movies in the 1990s. They weren't classic suspense / disaster films, but they had some ripping moments, good popcorn stuff. Did you really decide to make DZ:ViNW inferior to those films in every category? I mean, it must have been a conscious decision because that is the end product. It succeeds on not a single level.

Second question: since you have no inkling of how to build suspense, can't you admit that to yourself and give yourself an education; couldn't you at least hunker down with a dozen Hitchcock films and study how a master does it? He doesn't hit you over the head with LOTS of shouting of inanities ("It's going to blow," "We've got to get out of here," etc.) or have music hitting EVERY SINGLE MOMENT with some scene-to-scene scoring? Music is a spice, not the whole meal. DZ:ViNW's use of music is like chewing gritty pepper.

Did I mention "hitting"? My eyeballs were hit and hit and hit again with the most "look at me" use of photographic annoyances extant. Jiggle zoom in. Jiggle zoom out. Jiggle pan. Jiggle. Jiggle. Jiggle. And do it all every single second. It doesn't look like hand-held, either. It looks like the camera was attached to a rock polisher, a cake mixer, a pile driver – whatever was handy that could make the viewer queasy, annoyed, and distracted. So much for mounting tension.

And the poor actors (actually some pretty good actors). This brings me to question three: why not make it a silent picture since you have no ear for dialogue or how people actually speak and act in dramatic situations? Seriously, the best actors in the world can't make lead look like diamonds. Of course, caring about these actors in their roles is a joke. No matter how close they are to searing death, no matter how precarious their emotional circumstances, I could only chuckle.

To summarize: DZ:VINW is really no worse, no better than the other under-shoe feculence of the Sci-Fi Channel (not counting it's rather good series, Stargate and Battlestar).

I'm sure the film makers are nice people and will do good work elsewhere. But there's something about the Sci-Fi Channel that contractually forces talent to make dreck.

Matt (Costas Mandylor) works in the underground pipelines of New York City, with a lot of other brave men and women. Usually, when the ground trembles, it means that the subway is passing overhead. But, one day, disaster strikes. Hot steam shoots out of some pipes and kills three of his co-workers. What is going on? Unfortunately, a misguided scientist, Dr. Levering (Michael Ironside) has been working on a geothermal experiment, at a local politician's urging. Although Levering thinks he has his bases covered, the deep drilling breaks into a magma layer, complete with fire and steam. Soon, a gentleman in Queens, who is working on his lawn, gets incinerated with a blast of flames from a sewer hole. Into the mess comes Dr. Susan (Alexandra Paul). She is a geologist and Matt's ex-wife. The mayor has asked her to look into the strange goings on beneath the earth. Natually, the two former spouses butt heads a few times, although Matt respects Susan's opinion. Will they save the city from more disaster? This film has some intriguing concepts but just a so-so delivery. Also, it has some rather violent scenes of death and destruction and may not be for everyone. However, the acting is rather good and so are the effects. But, the story is sometimes hard to follow, the lines are typical and the direction a wee bit above average. If you are a fan of disaster or science fiction films, by all means, seek this one out. Despite its weaknesses, it beats reruns every time.

This is about a group of underground tunnel workers in NY who come across some molten lava while digging a new sewer. There's also a mad scientist who's conducting experiments in geo-thermal power which involves digging deep into the earth and using the heat to power a generator or something. That's what causes the volcano to start erupting. The woman who comes to investigate for the government just happens to be the ex-wife of the tunnel digger, and of course we run through the usual cliché of them disliking each other and then getting back together over the course of the movie. There's also a lot of time spent as some federal bureau comes in, shuts down the work of our heroes, and blames the whole thing on terrorists. Yes, someone has to stand in the way of our heroes doing what must be done, if for no other reason than that it's in the handbook of required clichés for disaster movies.

Overall, it's just insanely cheesy and silly, with lines like "They're screwing with the pressure of the Earth's crust". Another scene involves lava erupting out of a guy's house and killing 70 people, but the authorities are apparently too stupid to notice the lava (I would think it would be painfully obvious), so they think it was a terrorist bomb. I also got a kick out of how a wood frame house could contain molten lava - until the guy opens the door! The special effects are funny throughout the whole movie, it adds a certain B movie charm I suppose. I especially liked the part where a single pistol round is all that's required to reroute the lava from one tunnel to another. The acting is pretty spotty, the evil genius guy is prone to scenery chewing, and one of the female characters manages to pull off Mexican, Italian and Czechoslovakian accents over the course of her performance. The two main characters turn in good enough performances.

I say this is not too terrible - for a disaster movie - because there's no sappy melodrama involving kids, pregnant women, sanctimonious paramedics, or inner city gang members. There's no speech by the black or female president at the end saying "we should have listened to the environmentalists". And best of all, there's no little girl looking at a bunch of people covered in volcanic ash and saying "Look mommy, they're all the same color". Oddly enough, for a disaster movie, the "special" effects actually serve as a backdrop for the story, not the other way around. But still it's just so tiresomely predictable that it's hard to make it through to the end.

It's hard to say which was more toxic: the magma or the camera work in this film.

Endless dart-in's, dart-out's, dizzying pans, rapid-fire jump-cuts, unnecessary point-of-view changes, and so on. It was like some two-year-old kid was playing with a video-cam. Irritating in nature, devoid of purpose, it has become a pandemic in made-for-TV flicks.

Once the bumbling camera movement has you popping sea-sickness pills, the movie introduces you to the same old assembly-line stereotypical characters rehashed on a hundred other made-for-TV flicks. You've got some Einstein-wanna-be scientist causing the menace, a bunch of blue collar heroes that are the only ones who want to save the city, a female scientist that discovers the problem but nobody listens, politicians who are breaking the law and not listening to reason, dimwits in an anti-terrorism unit, and a few extras whose only reason for existence is obviously to be victims. Two of the above serve as the obligatory divorced couple rekindling their romance while people get zapped by lava all around them.

Most imbecilic scenes: some magma burps a skull out, landing near some horrified witnesses, it's still (no, I'm not kidding) smoking like a piece of burnt toast. A guy opens a door, and lava pours out, like storage out of an over-filled closet. A fisherman catches a fish and says--oh never mind; you'd never believe it, anyway.

Anyone with an IQ over 30 would detect about a zillion scientific plot holes. If you want serious fare, skip this movie. If all you want is a cheesy disaster flick, with a lot of unintentional camp, then this one will fit the bill. Just be sure to have sea-sickness pills close at hand.