Méga Cyclone

A good cast composed of war and sci fi veterans (Ironside) and up and coming talent (Midkiff, Carter, Toersz, Jostyn, etc) is assembled in this medium-low budget disaster film. The plot completely lacks any scientific plausibility, but tries pretty hard to generate a modicum of believability and suspense anyway. Essentially, the air force has been developing a secret weapon capable of producing or controlling an incredibly violent storm. This weapon involves flying a large aircraft into a hurricane at high speed. Just as the project is shut down, a stealth meteor has a near miss with earth and stirs up a super-storm which will make the East coast of North America uninhabitable for hundreds of years, if not forever. Note that the 'black comet (sic)' is apparently undetected by our planet's multitude of astronomers because it is black!!!! I am not kidding. So, the pilot and scientist who lead the original Stormfury team are reluctantly recalled to reverse-engineer the storm. A few subplots are tossed in for seasoning. Essentially, the plot combines poor comprehension of a number of legitimate contemporary concerns with a variety of pop environmental paranoias and adds Michael Ironside.

The film is not quite as bad as "The Day After Tomorrow" but don't get me wrong - it's still pretty bad. The acting is mostly good. The directing, editing, effects and cinematography are adequate - though not particularly interesting. Philip Roth produced and directed, drawing on his very rapidly growing repertoire of mediocre low-budget action and sci fi films to good advantage. Roth knows how to crank 'em out and keep 'em under-budget. Given the idiocy of the story line, this would have been a far greater disaster under less competent management. The script is pretty flat and limits character development but keeps everything moving and doesn't lose focus.

Just out of curiosity I did a wee bit of research on DEJ Productions. You might want to follow in my tracks. The Company has an amazing productivity and has been responsible for a vast array of low-mid budget films which span many genres. Among their portfolio you might notice the 2005 Academy Award winner "Crash". No connection, just a fun and fruity factoid.

Hollywood spends hundreds of millions on crap movies like the Avengers and others...I had more fun watching this movie than the big budget ones...keep my attention with laughs thrown in...try watching and enjoying without thinking what can and cannot be done in reality. I grew up watching black and white serials at the movies on Saturday afternoons...this movie is pure escapism, enjoy.

DEJ puts out a huge amount of movies made from a low budget. Some just over a million dollars - which may be a nice income for you and I; but merely nothing for making a film...strange but true.

However most of their titles are truly bad...some laughable bad and some just outright horrible to even think it could have made it past page one of the shooting script.

This movie however is still somewhat entertaining. Though immediately you know that there is no big money put behind it...the most well known cast is Michael Ironside...

A natural disaster flick which must have been one of the best scripts to been dropped on a production office desk for DEJ and UFO film productions.

This makes the rest of their films pale in comparison.

It's entertaining, but it would be a better TV movie than a feature film...however rainy days do come from time to time and this is one that would fit right in the VCR or DVD machine on a rainy day.

Is Michael Ironside so desperate he must resort to rubbish like this, which is so beneath him?

The plot was amazingly cookie cutter and predictable but that wasn't the worst of it. The science was some of the most pitifully inaccurate I've seen in a movie which was not intentionally a parody. You might as well try to put out forest fires with a giant vacuum cleaner which sucks them up only to deposit them in a cold climate to help warm all the little children suffering from the cold.

Where is MST3K when you need it?

Toss this drivel in the trash heap. There's no redeeming value here for anyone.

The plot: A killer storm threatens to destroy the entire eastern seaboard, unless a courageous team can use a secret military project to save everyone.

This is one of the most boring disaster movies that I can remember seeing. In a pastiche of disaster scenarios, the killer storm is blamed on several different causes, including global warming and a near-hit by a meteor. I think there were more, but it was so boring, jumbled, and ridiculous that I was already losing interest.

It wouldn't have been so bad, if there had been any characters that were interesting, but they all seemed like cardboard cutouts of B movie stereotypes. They kept going on about the stupidest, most boring plot elements, as well. Unlike The Core, which was based on infamously bad science, Maximum Velocity really doesn't have anything else in it. I could sit back and enjoy The Core as a "so bad it's good" B movie, but with Maximum Velocity, I was constantly thinking to myself, "How much longer does this movie have to go?"

I eventually bailed on it after 45 minutes. I just couldn't take it any more. If the movie actually gets any better after the midpoint, I'd be amazed, because the first half sure isn't winning any awards (except possibly a Razzie). Normally, I hate giving up on movies, but I couldn't see any reason why I should punish myself with another 45 minutes of boredom.

Don't be fooled by the movie advertising Michael Ironside in a starring role. Maybe if he'd actually been the star, I'd have stuck it out.