Ablaze

Although I have been a firefighter for 23 years, I make it a point to not be overly critical when the technical "advisors" drop the ball as they so often have (even on Backdraft and Ladder 49). However, the absolute disregard for any reasonable correctness in this abomination is unforgivable.

But the firefighting aspects aside, this movie to date stands alone as the worst that I have ever seen. Ever. I accept some of the blame for not ejecting the thing but it was like a train wreck. I could not look away.

As we all can attest, some movies by virtue of their awfulness can be fun. (i.e. Ed Wood's side-splitting "Plan-9 From Outer Space") This was not one of them. "Ablaze" is one of the many Hollywood debacles that must beg the question, "where do they get the money?".

I have been interested in disaster films since seeing the ?Poseidon Adventure? in 1972 (among the better made) and over the years I have seen many, some good, many bad. I rented this film,interested by the box?s description. When I actually started to watch it, I felt like I was experiencing deja vu. In 1979, another film was released called ?City on Fire? with an identical plot involving a city, an industrial complex, and firestorm. Having seen it about three times, I am somewhat familiar with the plot. ?Inferno? is nearly identical, in fact it is if someone took that other script, altered some things and came up with this. The kid trapped in the house, the hospital trapped in the firestorm, the scaffolding falling on people running from the hospital, the guy running into the burning building to retrieve a file, and the gauntlet of fire people must run to escape the hospital are a number of examples. Another person stated that some scenes looked like stock footage from the 70s, the reason for this is that many of those scenes appeared to have been lifted from ?City on Fire.? This film was an embarrassment to those performing in it and the writer should be ashamed of themselves. I am surprised the original scriptwriter did not try and sue for copyright infringement. They say that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, in this case it is not.

just to warn everyone how bad this "film" is. Acting, directing, make up, script... I bet even the food served to the cast and crew on set made everyone sick.

The main plot and all of the sub plots suck. Nothing is logical, scenes are re-used, and mistakes are everywhere. Here are some examples from the first 30 minutes of the film:

The bad guys "get away" car loses its' front bumper in a crash and then regains it. The power cord leading to the rotating red light on top of the cop car switches from inside to outside the door frame in milliseconds.

The actor in the first fire stunt is so covered with protective gel he looks like "grease man." A ranging fire starts inside a bedroom so fast that only gallons of gasoline could have been responsible. A plastic toy kangaroo survives the blazing inferno for at least 10 minutes while only inches from the flames. The "firemen" all run into the inferno without masks, oxygen, or even gloves. Then they stroll about perfectly upright throughout the blazing structure as without a care in the world. One actor falls down and barely bumps his head and then everyone expects him to die. Which he does, but only after a twenty minute death bed confession.

It goes on and on and on. See how many you can spot.

So bad it is almost funny

I have to turn off the TV and go to work now, thank God.

Mike

This film is a waste of time. Much of the footage was taken from the 1979 film,City on fire,starring Leslie Nielson,. Ice-T had very few lines. Go to the video store and rent the original,City on fire, with better cast. Leave Ablaze alone, not worth watching,a waste of time.

Absolutely terrible. How can abominations like this ever be made? A decent premise (city put in danger by big corporation, heroically saved by firefighters), but an absolute cliche ridden script of the worst order, hammy acting by a cast who don't seem to know whether to play it for laughs, and very cheap and repetitive special effects. Must have been a stuntmans hog heaven, because we get to see lots of people wandering around on fire and falling from buildings for no good reason. Ice-T, despite taking second billing, appears only for about a minute at the start and a minute at the end. Tom Arnold picks up his cheque by sleepwalking through his role, and the rest of the cast must have been desperate for work and are desperately under rehearsed or just unfamiliar with the script.

You know something is badly wrong when in the intro scene, a man sets on fire by the side of an extremely large lake, yet prefers to wander around going 'argh, argh' rather than THROWING HIMSELF IN THE LAKE! The final climactic scene is frankly laughable - not even 'good in a bad way' as people make mistakes that they simply wouldn't do in real life (walking around slowly and having a look at the pretty fires rather than running like hell). Do yourself a favour and avoid this turkey.