Superfire

Superfire is a special effects-heavy telefilm that takes a look at the high-risk world of smoke jumpers and tanker pilots who must contend with a deadly phenomenon that is all-too-possible.

In the forests of the western United States, where controlled burns are no longer policy and old timber reigns, three raging fires threaten to merge into a "superfire," the world's worst possible kind of fire with the explosive power to rival an atomic bomb. With a group of teenagers stranded in the forest and a residential development already overrun, two pilots and their ground team are the last line of defense to save an entire Oregon town from destruction.

Whilst on night-shift I happened to catch this durge on Sky movies. All I can say is that after about half of it I wished I was in the center of that fire. I know it's a TV movie and on a low budget but thats no excuse for making a film that made me want to scoop my eyeballs out with a rusty teaspoon. Avoid at all costs.

Not a good movie. At all. Extraordinarily unrealistic...even for a movie. The teenagers stumble out of the ravaged forest looking like they spent then night at a Holiday Inn, and then messed up their hair and put a little dirt on their faces. The firefighters, dead and alive, are in their personal fire shelters upside down...lying on their backs instead of huddled face down underneath the shelter...they're not sleeping bags! jeez. someone didn't do their research. And well in short...the movie was ridiculous. The story of real smokejumpers is pretty dramatic stuff. It's a shame this movie didn't do it justice at all. Really, really cheap attempt at drama.

"Superfire" tells of a raging forest fire from both the perspective of some innocents caught up in the blaze and the smoke jumpers and pilots who fight it. A melodramatic and obvious B-flick, what "Superfire" lacks in class, sophistication, and budget, it makes up for in busy-ness. For example, you got your hero with the bad rap and bad rep in a love/hate thing going on with the resident babe. You got your techno junk stuff which keeps you posted on the fire so everything's as obvious as the "E" on an eye chart. You got your plane held together with spit and a prayer and a bomb thingy which could cook off at any second. You got your cute girl and her mommy and friends helplessly caught in the blaze. You got your smoke jumpin' ground crew who's about to be stir fried. Etc. Etc. And, of course, you got your fire...lots and lots of fire. So, for all it's silly, hacked, contrived, and transparent nonsense, "Superfire" may keep you so busy and involved you don't notice the short side of the flick too much. I don't care much for fire flicks and yawned through "Backdraft". But, "Superfire" I just kind of grinned, bared it, and enjoyed. A must for fire freaks and a good couch potato watch for others. (C+)

Note - If you like this kind of flick, check out Spielberg's "Always" (1989).

This movie tries to capture the generational larger than life force of nature of "Twister" with the human drama of duty and loss of "Backdraft", but made with zero budget and double the run time. The result is a three hour journey into dullness and boredom.

The characters are very one dimensional and unlikable. The male protagonist is the maverick that has to do things his way and turns his nose up at authority. Nothing is done to make him have any kind of spiritual awakening and become a better person, rather they feed into this and give him his "I told you so" moment. The female protagonist pretty much dresses down everyone she addresses and walks around on a cloud of sanctimony. Everyone else follows the same cookie cutter archetypes - the grizzled veteran, the over anxious rookie, the stern boss that doesn't appreciate the main protagonist, etc. Added to the fact that they almost never have a nice thing to say to each other, you end up not caring about their fate because of their attitudes.

And the effects are just terrible and not well hid at all by people that either know or take pride in their craft. CGI fires and matte paintings of the burning forest that doesn't match the color of the real sky. Also, this being a New Zealand production acting like they are in Portland, Oregon, you would think they would have done a bit more research on the city. Instead, they represented a city of over 750k people with crisscrossing rivers and discernible landmarks with a housing subdivision with about 10 houses in the middle of the woods and made up wilderness locations and no mention of Mt. Hood.

This is a three hour disaster version of "Angela's Ashes". John Noble probably did this movie between The Two Towers and Return of the King because his wife needed a new pair of shoes. Wes Studi probably got a hernia doing this movie from carrying the entire cast on his back being far and away the best thing about this movie.

2/10 - Just rent Twister and Backdraft.