The Fire Next Time (1993)

When this was first televised as a two part mini-series I watched the first night and opted out for the 2nd. Now, after renting it from Portland's finest (and the country's finest, if truth be told) video store MOVIE MADNESS and watching the entire four hours I can safely say that buried inside the 240 minute mammoth of overcooked plotting and sweaty melodramatics is a fine 90 minute movie.Craig T Nelson is a hell of a good actor and that's the trouble: he plays a completely unlikable character to irritatingly well effect. There is no one to root for: Nelson's character is a selfish pig from the get-go and he never gets much smarter or nicer. I realize that its not his fault--the script makes everyone a symbol and he has to stand for The Guilty Short-Sighted Consumer of All The World's Goodies....other actors are saddled with equally heavy burdens to carry.Which leads me to another major drawback : the uneven tone of the script.We get semi-interesting first night scenes between the extremely underrated Charles Haid and Craig T. Nelson alongside some real second night howlers like the absurd scene with Lousie Fletcher-- who chirps to Bonnie Bedelia ( who I must say looks wonderful with her ample bosom on sweaty display) "In the morning you will be issued your regulation camouflage army fatigues; its our way of keeping our message of hope alive." I am not kidding, she actually says that--and she is supposed to be the representative of the Evil Pro-Earth whatever the hell you want to call them. Ludicrous. As is most of the rest of this thing. But there are some interesting notions. Not ALL worthless but you have to wade thru a lot of dumb stuff.

10 only because of Bonnie Bedila's assets on display. I caught this on the lifetime movie network earlier this week and it's 2005 and nothing has come to pass like predicted in this film. However, this movie does have 2 or should I say 4 redeeming qualities, mainly in the form of the mother and daughter. Bonnie Bedelia who plays the mom shows off her boobs in almost every scene and in a surprise in one scene you can see right into her nightshirt when she bends down and see full boobage. A real surprise for a TV. And it's a most impressive pair. The daughter is really hot too, although I'm sad to see her career has gone the daytime TV route and not the mainstream movie Ashley Judd nude scene or the playboy made cable TV route. Anyhow, watch this for the two hot women and just ignore the dumb story about how bad America is because of crap.

I'm watching this during one of the 5 coldest winters in recorded North American history in the Northeast US and maritime regions of Canada and I am amazed at how absolutely wrong this movie is in every regard. History will prove that this movie was based on hysterical false assumptions and pseudoscience. If you want to watch a group of mediocre actors have water blown on them , feel free to enjoy but don't make the mistake of believing that anything in this movie is remotely accurate.

This was one of the better TV mini series that has been shown on TV this decade. I was mesmerized while watching it and still remember vividly how I thought this could really happen. Given recent weather, I don't believe I was far wrong. It is awesome how many things in this movie have already come to pass. If there is any way of viewing it by any means I would really like to hear about them. I'm also trying to find out if there was a book published on this title. I wish all TV was as entertaining and as lasting as this movie was.