disaster

[7] A gaggle of Oscar-winners go topsy-turvy and fight to survive when a luxury liner capsizes at sea in the trend-setting disaster flick, The Poseidon Adventure. The film delivers on producer Irwin Allen’s desire to blow shit up (think of him as the proto-Michael Bay), but also manages to give its venerable cast plenty to chew on. The characters are engaging and no one is …

[7] When a high school class boards a plane for a field trip to Paris, one of the students (Devon Sawa) has a premonition that the plane will explode. He freaks out and unboards, bringing a few others with him (including Seann William Scott and Dawson’s Creek costar Kerr Smith), and sure enough — boom! But the kids find out that fate doesn’t like to …

[8] Every spring, I feel jaded when it comes to Hollywood tent pole flicks, and every summer I end up being surprised at how much I enjoy a few of them. Maybe it’s a result of low expectations, or maybe I love monster movies and disaster movies so much, they just have to be pretty shitty before I’ll give ’em the thumbs down. Anyway, I’ll …

[5] Earthquake is one of many disaster films that came out in the early ’70s — the kind where a rag-tag team of waning celebrities band together to get thrown around for a couple of hours. In this one, Charlton Heston and Ava Gardner headline as a married couple on the outs. She’s a pill popper and he’s seeing a young widow (Genevieve Bujold) on …

[7] I’m always on the lookout for a good monster movie, and Godzilla is one of the most legendary monsters in movie history, right? But he’s still not a sure thing. We all remember the Dean Devlin and Roland Emmerich crap-fest from 1998, right? Well, thank goodness Monsters director Gareth Edwards takes the big lizard more seriously than they did. And thank goodness Edwards knows …

[7] The Irwin Allen disaster epic is alive and well in this 1996 summer blockbuster in which evil aliens threaten to destroy Earth, leaving it up to a rag-tag team of politicians, soldiers, and scientists (plus a drunken crop-duster and a pole dancer!), to save humanity. The writing and directing team of Roland Emmerich and Dean Devlin (Stargate, Godzilla) almost strike the perfect tone for …

[6] I don’t normally like bad movies. I don’t usually subscribe to the “so bad, it’s good” mentality. Bad is just bad. But there are rare exceptions and Airport 1975 is one them. First of all, the Airport franchise is ridiculous. I mean, they made four of these things, and it’s the same story every time: a plane full of celebrities falls into jeopardy and …

[5] After the mysterious death of his wife sends him on a hunt for clues, a journalist ends up in a small West Virginia town where a series of strange events and sightings of a shadowy, supernatural character portend an oncoming disaster. Richard Gere and Laura Linney do respectable jobs as the reporter and town sheriff in this somewhat serviceable mystery-thriller, but the script is …

[6] Gravity is so harrowing, I’m tempted to call it crisis porn. The movie stars Sandra Bullock and George Clooney as astronauts stranded in orbit over Earth after debris destroys their spacecraft. Director Alfonso Cuarón (Children of Men, A Little Princess) warns us from the get-go with some on-screen text that life in space is impossible, and then proceeds to throw everything you can imagine …

[5] The least entertaining (even in a cheezy way) of the Airport disaster ilk. The star-studded cast seems to realize what a turkey they’re in, but mad cheers to Olivia de Havilland, Christopher Lee, Lee Grant, and Darren McGavin for making the most of it. Grant in particular really chews up the scenery here. Everyone else in the cast, including Jimmy Stewart, Jack Lemmon, Joseph …

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