Panique sur la ville

I live in Moab, Utah where this movie was filmed (along with many John Ford/Wayne westerns in the 40's-60's). This film is so stupid that it is funny and that is the way one needs to look at it. It is real fun for me because I grew up here and recognize, and have been at, every place a scene was filmed (except the jail LOL). It is also fun for me because I know many of the locals who had bit parts. This film is pure camp. If one views it as such you might just have a fun time.

On the surface, a very bad action adventure film. But, if not taken too seriously, it's a lot of fun. When a mad scientist poisons the water supply of a small Utah town, it's up to a drifter, a celebrity lawyer and two local cops to bring order to a town where the the citizens are now possessed by rage and violence. The last half hour reveals the film for what it truly is: a modern day western, as the good guys mount up to trail the bad guys for a showdown. Filmed with style on a small budget, featuring a score by Hans Zimmer of all people, the story only fails in the last ten minutes where the director just seemed to run out of story.

This is possibly one of the worst films I have ever seen in my life. I could talk about everything from the bad acting to the non-sensical plot, but it'd be a waste of time. You only need to watch the first half-hour of the film to know it really sucks. It doesn't even have any camp value to it! This film was so bad, it hurt my feelings!

"Nightmare at Noon" is a very uneasy mixture of high tech sci-fi and standard western shoot em up. Brion James is visually impressive as the albino mute villain, but that's about it. Bo Hopkins and Wings Hauser act like they are in a mismatched buddy cop movie, while George Kennedy plays the local sheriff. There is some dark humor that slightly elevates things, but overall this is simply a B movie. Lots of green goo, gratuitous big explosions, nice scenery, a great number of "F" bombs, and a goes on forever helicopter battle, which incidentally seems like it belongs in a completely different film. Not totally bad, but not even borderline good. - MERK

I saw this movie when it first came out, . Enjoyed the characters, first thought this was spin off of Death . Wish movie, do to name & background of the Bo Hopkins character . (is explained in part during the café fighting scene) . With it's low budget, they did fairly good with the movie . Imagine what could have been if they had double the money . Only real scary part (do to today's terrorists activities, is the .idea of poisoning the water supply) . This age of remakes, maybe someone should dust-off the script . and with a bigger budget, might make a decent movie.

.It's B-Movie sci-fi & western, no more, nothing less.