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In the 1970s and into the very early 80s, disaster films were very popular and brought in a lot of money. The movies were HUGE and sensational...and the king of the genre was Irwin Allen. He produced such blockbusters as "The Towering Inferno" and "The Poseidon Adventure" and he was so successful that there were many copycat films by other producers, such as "Earthquake" and the "Airport" movies. But the problem with the genre was that they ran low on ideas and after a while the plots and disasters became stupider and more farfetched. This led to really bad films like "The Swarm" and "Concorde...Airport '79"...which effectively put the nails into the coffin of disaster epics. Still, there were hopes of reinvigorating the genre which led to some latter films like "When Time Ran Out...".

"When Time Ran Out..." was one of Irwin Allen's productions. But because the public had already seen many disaster films with star-studded casts, this one felt to many like an example of 'been there/done that' and it fizzled at the box office.

This story is set on a tropical island in the Pacific. A company is drilling for oil on this same island where there is also a resort full of rich vacationer. But the island is also volcanic and the hubris and greed of the drilling company result in a disaster being unleashed...one that could easily turn all these tourists and oil company techs into crispy critters!

Like the other Irwin Allen disaster epics, this one has a very impressive cast...with Paul Newman, Jacquelin Bisset and William Holden in the leads. And, as you expect, a ton of A and B-list actors are there to lend support...as well as to become human torches.

As for the plot, it's the usual formula and the story isn't good nor bad...it's just pretty typical. But what IS different is that the special effects look relatively cheap and are little like the great sets, explosions and the like of Allen's 1970s films. In particular, seeing folks falling off the bridge into the lava...well, it could have been done better with Barbie dolls! Additionally, there seem to be less explosions...possibly to save money.

So is it worth seeing? Possibly. I'd place this in the category of a time-passer and not much more. It's NOT horrible (and wow, are there some horrible disaster epics out there) but it's also incredibly familiar and offers little to make you want to see it.

3/14/18. I have forgotten how suspenseful these old disaster movies were, even formulaic as they were. Why mess with what works? Irwin Allen was always good with that: A love triangle, a helicopter, a loss of one or two of the big stars and you got yourself a hit. While many of the big stars featured were mostly past their prime, that was okay when the disaster was actually THE STAR of the movie. Catch it for nostalgia's sake.

WHEN TIME RAN OUT… is a silly, superficial and often cheesy coda to the cycle of disaster movies produced by Irwin Allen in the 1970s. As a huge fan of disaster movies, I found myself enjoying this film a lot, even if everything that happens has been done before and better. This film sees an all-star cast menaced by a volcano on an Pacific island, and you can pretty much guess every plot point along the way if you've seen any of Allen's other, earlier, better disaster flicks.

Still, you can't say that Allen doesn't try his best…it's just that the budget (or lack of it) lets him down this time around. The volcano itself is a silly little miniature, the rivers of lava are back-projected nonsense, and the final 'disaster' scene at the hotel is so poor as to beggar belief. Even ignoring the below-par special effects, this film takes the biscuit. Although it's notably shorter than the likes of THE TOWERING INFERNO, it takes half the running time for the volcano to actually blow, and until that point we have lots of cheesy dialogue scenes involving romance between uninteresting characters.

Thankfully, things really get going once the disaster hits home as Allen throws tsunamis, explosions, cliffslides and whatnot into the mix. Twinkly-eyed Paul Newman is on hand, thankfully, to take charge and act all manfully, although he's up against a scheming James Franciscus as the island resort's owner who'll stop at nothing to protect his investments. Also caught up in the mix are the usual stereotypes: doting (or should that be dotty) old timers (step forward, Burgess Meredith); hard-timers (Ernest Borgnine in his umpteenth disaster outing), youthful beauties (Barbara Carrera and Jacqueline Bisset, the latter looking a bit off) and even a few ethnic types too (Pat Morita, going Chinese). Much of the resultant running time follows Newman's group as they scramble for safety, evading dangers along the way.

It's no surprise as to who lives or dies, but the 'obstacle' scenes are great fun, especially the extended 'bridge crossing' which makes up the film's climax. And I'll never tire of those ultra-cheesy 'falling into lava' shots which are repeated at various intervals. It's just a shame that the volcano itself only has coming of a cameo appearance in the movie, and that the characters are never menaced by ash clouds or falling lumps of pumice…now that would have been something to see!

Another funny film by Irwin Allen. This one is a hoot to watch. I really like the blue screen effect whenever the lava is shown--lol. If it has Shelia Matthews in the cast, you can be sure that it is going to be a funny film, especially if it is a drama. The ending with the volcano is hilarious--I did not know that volcanos could shoot a fireball that far away and still hit the target head-on!! Impressive. Sort of like scenes from "Bird of Paradise" meets "Diamond Head" were taken and spliced together and then had a few more ingredients added. All that was missing was the sacrificial virgin--but then, maybe that is why the volcano exploded--LOL. Not a movie to be missed for laughs!!

• 2/5 STARS -

The operator of a tropical hotel conceals the mounting threat of the island's active volcano when his laissez-faire partner and a renegade oilman start asking questions. When the volcano finally blows its top, a small group of hotel residents make a dangerous trek to higher ground, but not all will survive as the peak spews smoke, fire, and lava across the island.

This relaxed disaster movie signals the end of the first Golden Age of Disaster movies. It is appropriate, then, that it was produced by Irwin Allen and recycles a variety of cliches that spanned the seventies. When Paul Newman and Jacqueline Bisset start sipping wine on the beach with the volcano in the distance, for example, we know to start counting the minutes until the mountain blows.

With both Paul Newman and William Holden playing roles very similar to those in "The Towering Inferno", it isn't difficult to draw parallels between the two movies. "The Towering Inferno", however, was a unique project involving a joint venture between two studios, a huge budget, an all-star cast, and a blockbuster script culled from the best elements of two popular novels. Does When Time Ran Out represent what we should expect from Irwin Allen when all of the cards AREN'T stacked in his favor?

When Time Ran Out harkens back to the drama-heavy days of the original Airport, with a web of infidelity that will make your head spin. Battle lines are quickly drawn between the defensive developer of the island (Franciscus) and a renegade oil driller (Newman) who believes the mountain is, as he puts it, `a powder keg.'

Occasional visits to the volcano's crater provide distraction while the relationships between the characters are cultivated for the disaster. The oilman stirs up trouble when he wants to see for himself that the mountain is safe before drilling in a high-pressure oilfield. However, it's just ridiculous to think that his inspection would involve stepping into a laughable protective capsule and being lowered inside the smoldering volcano. Naturally, the capsule--with a glass floor!--experiences a series of unexplained malfunctions that send him hurtling towards bubbling lava at the bottom of the crater.

It's the kind of special effect that Irwin Allen was famous for from his television days on The Time Tunnel and elsewhere. But the silver screen requires a much greater level of believability than is needed by television. When Time Ran Out contains some of the worst effects in the history of the genre--images which aren't even acceptable for the SMALL screen. What happened to the Master of Disaster?

When Time Ran Out is heavy on talk before the volcano erupts, but the runaway action we were expecting during the buildup simply never arrives. Only two action sequences occur with the Newman followers, and they both involve a large group of people taking a very long time to cross a treacherous path to safety. It's a snooze-fest all around.

The special effects are ho-hum, even though Irwin Allen attempts to diversify the experience with flaming meteors fired from the volcano and a tidal wave that inexplicably levels part of the same island whose shock wave created it! They're not enough. Most of the visuals are clearly pre-existing volcano footage placed on a chroma-key in front of the actors. And the rest of the eruption footage appears to be poorly executed post-production animation.

The lush tropical setting is a refreshing change of pace for most disaster movies, and Jacqueline Bisset and Paul Newman try their best to keep things classy. But an unnecessary cock fight in the village and a preposterous laboratory perched on the rim of the volcano immediately suggest that this movie needs a dose of reality--and adrenalin. The first Golden Age of Disaster Movies closes with this whimper as `time runs out'-- on the genre.