Ciudad en llamas

MST3K did a nice job with this in their first season. It is one of the better films Joel and the Bots have roasted - not saying much since most of their little treats occupy the worst 300 films of all time here on IMDb.

The acting is variable, and you occasionally feel as if you are watching two different films which were spliced together in order to reach an hour and a half. Leslie Nielson, as ridiculous as it may seem, delivers the best dramatic performance of the lot.

Basically, a obsessive individual gets the wrong promotion at an oil refinery, mouths off at his boss and then, after getting fired, leaks oil all over the entire city and sets it ablaze. Like most of the disaster films of its time, we are introduced to 3-4 different characters who will play some role as either heroes or commentators on the events. The film climaxes as the massive fire approaches a brand-new hospital where Mr. Numan plays one of the heads of surgery.

If you get a chance to see this in its MST3K version, by all means do so. It is one of the earliest truly funny episodes of the legendary show. If you can't see this with Joel and the bots, avoid it at all costs. It burns....

One of the last of the 70's disaster movie made after T.V. had saturated the genre. The only reason I saw this when it played in a theater was because it was double-billed with "Phantasm" which I HAD to see. The only thing I really remember about this movie was the one scene where some woman has to give mouth to mouth to some old guy who is spitting up a vile looking substance. That frightened me away from CPR forever. I think you will be rooting for the fire before the movie ends.

Hey movie buffs, How are you all doing? I here to discuss the movie "City on Fire" (1979). Overall, I thought it was a decent disaster movies. For a movie that was made back in the late 1970's, it was pretty good. I know that there are a few movie buffs out there that will think that I am crazy (Hence the 918,a police code where I live for Crazy Person). But the only problems that I found was that the movie was set in Canada and yet they if you look carefully you could see the American flag and how does an oil/chemical works factory that starts on fire burn the entire city. I would sure like to know that. If anybody knows please let me know, please. But other than that, what more can you ask in a disaster movie: great actors/actoresses, crazy plot, for you disaster movie buffs Shelly Winters:). Keep watching movies and long live Hollywood and misc. production companies.

I'm a disaster movie fan and completist so I've been tracking this down for years, I wish I could say it was worth it. It's good for a laugh or two at the improbable idiocy of the plot but that's about the end of its worth.

Closing in on the bottom of the barrel this flick makes no sense, picking up and dropping plot points at random intervals. The villain of this thing is so sketchily drawn you have only the vaguest idea of what his motive is. That is the largest failing of the film there is no clear focus to anything.

None of the characters are compelling enough to invest in and the special effects are laughable. Not a single one is clearly drawn enough for the viewer to know who they are so you can root for them. Full of one time stars this uses them ill. Shelley Winters at least tries to give a performance but Ava Gardner and Henry Fonda, both looking the worse for wear, obviously did it strictly for the loot and are phoning it in, Henry being the worst offender.

If you're a disaster movie junkie this is a must see but for anyone else its a Grade Z mess.

City On Fire is a disaster movie about... well a city on fire which gave several ageing Hollywood stars something to do in the late 70's. At the end of the 1970's and pretty much at the end of the disaster movie's original box office trend came City On Fire a film that fizzled fast but featuring a certain player out of a certain earlier disaster movie, can you guess???? It's Ava Gardner, having survived Earthquake and The Cassandra Crossing, City On Fire would be her final disaster movie, although it's true in this film she isn't given much to do, she does add a comic twist to a film that shouldn't really be funny in the first place.

City On Fire tells the story of a modern day large American city, in reality that large American city was actually Montreal, in Canada, this city which is never named has a rather large, looming, dangerous feature, an oil refinery, (starting to get an idea of what might happen in this film?) Yes if you have fired up your imagination you may have already guessed that it is this oil refinery and one annoyed employee who is passed over for promotion who sets off a change of events that leads to a series of explosions at the plant and across the city, buildings burst into flames, people run around screaming, cars are thrown into the air, TV presenters swear and walls fall down revealing men on the toilet.

As the heat is turned up and city starts to burn people at the brand new hospital are trapped in a potential firestorm, this would mean that all the oxygen within the hospital would be burnt out along with everything else in the surrounding area. A rescue attempt is set in motion for the trapped people and patients.

The film has long been given a rough ride, true it isn't an amazing piece of cinema and it does rely to heavily on stock footage of fires but among that is this fairly interesting and exciting story of the rescue attempt watched under by the supervision of fire chief Henry Fonda and local television presenter Ava Gardner, Shelley Winters is also thrown in for good measure having gone belly up in the Poseidon Adventure here she gets all hot under the collar as a caring but tough talking nurse. These three Hollywood legends are joined by funny man Leslie Neilsen who believe it or not is mayor of doomed city and only a few years away from his role in disaster movie spoof Airplane and a bunch of lesser names such as Barry Newman and Susan Clark in lead roles as chief doctor and rich widow whose money was burning a hole in her pocket.

Not a great film but it's Luke warm build up means the film fizzles out before it's big bang finish.