Scorcher

R

2002

1h 27m

Mystery & Thriller

Action

List

Reviews

3%

250+ Ratings

Audience Score

Tactical experts must detonate a nuclear bomb in Los Angeles before the Earth's shifting plates cause more devastation.

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Jo H

Despite a fabulous cast, I can only think that everyone involved had a major light bill came in that week, or this was a contractual obligation affair all round. Colonel Beckett (Dacascos) comes over as immature and 'Animal House'-like; Rutger Hauer as the President looks bored; the brilliant John Rhys-Davies is the odd-ball professorial expert on earthquakes and geology who has swallowed a dictionary. The solution to a geological fault accidentally tripped by Chinese nuclear testing is, of course, evacuate Los Angeles and let off a couple more bombs to get the fault to behave itself. No scenes of the panicked populace leaving town; a major explosion in a traffic tunnel, which colonel's daughter survives (of course) attracts zero attention; colonel's daughter then gets kidnapped by raving fundamental looney-pyromaniac (???) and needs rescuing; bomb squad is a disparate bunch of loopy sorts, possibly a tad deranged by experiences of Vietnam (?) except for requisite evil Government bastard who loathes the colonel (never find out why) and who will try and stop the bombs going off just to make the colonel look bad. The fact that the planet will just crap itself and no-one will care anyway seems to elude him, but then he is evil. Some mad fist fighting, evil bastard is down, then the Presidential jet arrives and lands in the deserted street, sent to rescue the survivors of evil bastard, doomsday snipers and raving looney pyromaniac; aforementioned Pres. jet takes off JUST as the bombs explode and the mushroom clouds rise.... Oh, please! There's 90 minutes of my life I won't get back.

Rated 0.5 out of 5 stars

07/27/22

Full Review

Audience Member

Terminator 2 - I mean, Daylight - okay, what I meant to say was Dante's Peak - no, wait. What was it? Oh, yeah, Scorcher features every character cliche in the book, pseudo-scientific babble and a laughable plot that even Ed Wood might shake his head at in embarrassed laughter. An even more effective disaster film would've been scrapping the movie and just releasing the footage of them making this. Full review at http://silverscreenfanatic.com/2014/12/08/what-the-hell-were-they-thinking-49/

Rated 0.5 out of 5 stars

01/24/23

Full Review

Audience Member

2014-05-19 not as awful as I expected from the horrible ratings. think I've seen it before though, or something a lot like it.

Rated 3 out of 5 stars

01/20/23

Full Review

Audience Member

This is a really good film. I quite like disaster films and this is one of my favorites. It has plenty of action from start to finish and kept me very hooked on the storyline and all the characters.

Rated 5 out of 5 stars

01/16/23

Full Review

Audience Member

The look is not too bad, but it is a cheaply scripted and acted 'against the elements' movie with a highly improbable like most of these themed films have.

Rated 2 out of 5 stars

02/06/23

Full Review

Audience Member

This film... it has a certainly quality that makes you keep watching... until it shows a certain lack of quality and you realise you are never getting that hour in your life back. Its boiling... why is everyone still wearing jackets and 3 layers? arhhh, ok, well at least its all over now.

Rated 1 out of 5 stars

02/26/23

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James Seale

Director

Mark Dacascos

Ryan Beckett

Rutger Hauer

President Nelson

John Rhys-Davies

Dr. Matthew Sallin

Mark Rolston

Special Agent Kellaway

Rayne Marcus

Faith Beckett

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Emanuel Levy

EmanuelLevy.Com

Rated: 2/5

Oct 11, 2005

Full Review

Scott Weinberg

eFilmCritic.com

As low-rent and derivative as a knock-off can possibly be - which is both a good thing and bad. But mostly bad.

Rated: 2/5

Nov 11, 2003

Full Review

Christopher Null

Filmcritic.com

almost bad enough to merit watching simply for kitsch value

Rated: 2/5

Aug 28, 2003

Full Review

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Synopsis

Tactical experts must detonate a nuclear bomb in Los Angeles before the Earth's shifting plates cause more devastation.

Director: James Seale
Rating: R
Genre: Mystery & Thriller, Action
Original Language: English
Runtime: 1h 27m

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