Ablaze (2001) Reviews

• Someone set the script on fire

  Garry-102002-04-03

  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.

• A complete and utter load of worthless rubbish

  munitzs2005-08-05

  It could be a very lame poor parody of fire disaster films, but has not a jot of wit or intelligence. Poor camera work - some of it lifted from stock footage or other movies. Acting is incredibly lame. Scripting abysmal. Direction atrocious. Everything about this movie sucks big time. Whoever participated should be ashamed, and should be banned from movies for ever! One of the worst - no redeeming features. 2 stars for some interesting pictures of 1960s fire engines.

• Beyond the pale... Godless

  albaitis2005-05-15

  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?".

• this was a "how to" guide for making a bad movie

  pkzeewiz2010-04-21

  Okay my synopsis is going to make it sound better than it really is I am sure. A gung ho fireman is injured while saving a little boy from a house fire, meanwhile his brother is trying to set-up and bust a crooked man who owns most of the town and is running a very dangerous refinery that ends up catching fire while he is there inspecting it. The whole town goes up and the small, unequipped clinic in the middle of town is getting all of the fire victims and it is caught in the middle of a burning town. Firefighters have to get them out the best they can and all kinds of other junk is going on too...okay so my description isn't good either. This movie is bad production. The fires are either edited from old footage or CGI, the acting is horrible for the most part, and the good actors in this d-list cast have stupid dialog and actions to work with. This plot is bad... I mean a movie starting out with Ice-T "the cop killer" playing a cop as he seems to always do, as well as some nobody actor I have never seen before, is not a way to scream "watch this movie". We see all kinds of has beens and never have been actors like Tom Arnold, Cathy Lee Crosby, Amanda Pays, Pat Harrington, Jr., Edward Albert, Michael Dudikoff, Mary Jo Catlett, William Zabka and Christian Oliver. The movie is directed by sequel king turned porn king Jimmy Wynorski, who has brought us movies like BIG BAD MOMMA II, 976-EVIL II, THE RETURN OF THE SWAMP THING and SORRORITY HOUSE MASSACRE II. Stupid story lines include the cops in a dangerous high speed pursuit of a man who has a bomb taped to his chest; a little boy lighting toilet paper on fire attaching it to his airplane and throwing it on the floor in his bedroom, and workers in thick protective outfits welding while standing next to gasoline drainage. I didn't hate this movie, it was fun at times, and so bad it was good at other times. It looked like it was made for TV, but it has language of an R rating. I give it 3 out of 10 stars, its not a fireman movie like backdraft, its just a silly drama with many major problems.

• I joined this board while late for work

  forums-592008-04-08

  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