Violencia en la tempestad

Christian Slater plays an armored truck guard who has to deal with thieves, the crooked police, a fierce Indiana rainfall, and a flooded town while trying to protect three million dollars in the company vehicle. Well-done action flick isn't epic-scale, but does have many suspenseful close-calls and colorful characters, plus good performances by Slater, Morgan Freeman, Minnie Driver, and Richard Dysart and Betty White as an elderly couple who didn't evacuate when they were supposed to. Randy Quaid overplays heinously as a trigger happy sheriff, and the continual shootouts in the final third get repetitive, but this scenario (an entire town slowly being submerged) is exceptionally well-captured and the filmmakers didn't forget to add some good humor into the mix. **1/2 from ****

You could compare it with Rob Cohen's HURRICANE HEIST, not the story itself but the overall scheme and atmosphere. Heist disaster films are not so common after all. This one, despite being predictable, remains interesting, because you have several levels of characters armored truck drivers, hoodlums and rogue sheriff deputies. Morg Freeman is unusual in a gangster role, though not a brutal criminal either, rather sympathetic compared to the sheriff. Good photography and overall directing, good scenes, it's a shame that Mikael Solomon did not continue in the big screen movies business but instead TV series one.

If you are looking for a movie that has some action and is moderately entertaining without requiring much cerebral activity, this is right up your street. It suited my purposes at the time I rented it so I quite enjoyed it. I had heard nothing about it except for the preview I'd seen. Yes, it's no brilliant piece of movie-making, and no it won't change your life. But it is fun and entertaining and doesn't claim to be anything else. (I was pleasantly surprised with Betty White's performance, a long way from 'Golden Girls')

I first saw this on cable tv in the late 90s. Revisited it recently after more than two decades. This film came in the era wher lots of action films were already ruling the box office. Films like Broken Arrow, Face Off, Con Air, Rock, T-2, Speed, Die Hard 3, Point Break, Bad Boys, Mission Impossible, etc. The list is endless. These movies had already raised audiences expectations n this is one of the reason Hard Rain got sidelined. Another reason is that during the same era disaster films like Twister, Daylight, Dante's Peak n Volcano, has already satiated the audiences. The last reason is that audiences were not ready to accept Morgan Freeman as a villain, especially after his performance in Shawshank n Unforgiven. This film has lots of action n thrill throughout. I enjoyed it even after so many years. The scene where Freeman goes on a shooting rampage with both hands is amazing. It has some nasty death scenes, watch out for the guy whose eye gets shot thru his spectacles.

Huntingburg, Indiana faces flooding as the dam is forced to open the gates. Sheriff Mike Collins (Randy Quaid) is directing the evacuation even though he lost the election. Tom (Christian Slater) and his uncle Charlie (Edward Asner) are collecting cash in the armored truck but they are stranded in the flood road. Jim (Morgan Freeman) leads a group of thieves looking to rob the the truck. They kill Charlie as Tom escapes with the money. Karen (Minnie Driver) knocks him out thinking he's a looter.

The story is contrived. Mikael Salomon is mostly a TV director. Compared to Graham Yost's earlier hit Speed, this has all the action but lacks the fun. Betty White is able to add a couple of laughs. The acting is perfectly fine although they're not doing any heavy lifting. The rainy water action gets a bit mind-numbing with its sameness.