10.5Reviewed by Charlene Frydberg, 2010-03-08
i saw this movie and i liked a lot if you like movies like that you
might like
charlene
10.5Reviewed by Mr. R. K. Helliger, 2009-12-27
This is a great 2003 made for tv disaster movie.
When a scientist (Kim Dalaney) and her assistant (David Cubbitt),
try to warn the President (Beau Bridges), about a series of
earthqukes in San Franscisco, LA, and California, he gets his
friend, Lloyd Nolan, (Fred Ward), to head the FEMA team, to stop
it...
John Schneider, Kaley Cuoco, Ivan Sergei, and Dule Hill, give
support to the cast.
Co-writer/director John Lafia, ("Child's Play", "Man's Best
Friend", does a great job and the CGI effects are amazing....
The ending sets up for the sequel "10.5 Apocalyse"....
Recommended.
Four stars.
Robert Helliger.
What I thought of 10.5Reviewed by Jillian G. Cox, 2009-09-30
I found the storyline believeable and entertaining. As a
geo-science nut, I appreciated the science behind what was
happening and the possible solution.
The performance of the actors were top rate. Especially when the
President (Beau Bridges) started to get upset when the 10.5 quake
hit.
It's nice to watch a disaster movie where America does not "win the
day" but gets it's butt kicked.
Shocking and surprisingReviewed by Ahmed Daoud, 2009-06-24
10.5 may be not scientifically correct (a 10.5 crumble ould only
happen in a quake around the whole globe) but this movie keeps you
glued to your seat, thanks to a good storyline and thwarting
SFX.
The acting is actually allright, compared to many other
disaster-movies. It had great special effects, and a usual but
interesting story.
It's also a plus that the director, John Lafia, audiocomments on
this film - and tells you certain tricks on how they performed some
effects and stunts.
So if you like disaster movies, this one is a good choice!
"We could be looking at a seismic event larger than modern man has
ever witnessed before." - But 10.5 is no great shakesReviewed by H. Bala, 2009-04-01
Living in glitzy Los Angeles has its downside, what with the
landslides, the fires, the traffic, the smog, the paparazzi, the
gangs, the L.A. Clippers... and, yes, the earthquakes. This
mini-series 10.5 aired on NBC in 2004 and made a case for
relocating to the eastern seaboard, where they only deal with
hurricanes and blizzards and frostbite and such. And, really, those
things aren't near as awful as the Clippers.
Being neither expert nor fan of earthquakes, I can't tell you how
scientifically on point this movie is (but apparently it's not
very). But if you're into disaster flicks garnished with
television-appropriate special effects and cheesy melodrama and
personal angst - and why wouldn't you be? - then 10.5 is worth
looking into, but strictly as a guilty pleasure.
A train drops out of sight. A town goes missing. A series of famous
landmarks gets demolished, starting with the collapse of Seattle's
Space Needle in a quake registering a 7.9 on the Richter scale.
This opening sequence proves to be jarring in another way, tailored
as it is to an MTV/sports ad sensibility, with some bloke getting
tricky on his bicycle - but, of course, you can't out-trick or
outrace a force of nature. In short order we meet our cast, most of
whom are actually quite relevant to the crisis at hand. There's the
President of the United States, played with steadfast resolve by
Beau Bridges; Fred Ward's semi-dashing character heads up FEMA;
Rebecca Jenkins is the governor of California trying to put up a
brave front, even as her family goes missing during the quakes.
But, first and foremost, there's Dr. Samantha Hill, as played by
Kim Delaney. She's the main protagonist of this thing.
Dr. Hill - or "Sam" - is a brilliant seismologist but a control
freak, and as such doesn't work well with others. She's a deep
fault expert, and, despite the disbelief of her colleagues, it's
her theory which ends up saving the day. Sam speculates that a
series of unidentified faults is causing the chain reaction of
quakes, each successive one escalating in magnitude. If you've
entertained any of the more popular notions of what might happen to
California should the Big One come up, well, peep this
mini-series.
To round off the cast, there's John Schneider as the governor's ex
gone camping with his estranged teen daughter, and I guess nothing
cements a father-daughter bond quicker than an impending cataclysm.
The daughter, though, is very annoying with all the shrieking and
the selfishness and the shrieking. And then there's the cocky
surgeon (because there always has to be an arrogant schmoe in these
things) and his more reserved fellow doctor, who's having his own
family issues.
In the ranks of disaster films, this one doesn't really come close
to classics like AIRPORT ((Airport Terminal Pack (Airport/Airport
'75/Airport '77/Airport '79 - The Concord)), The Towering Inferno
(Special Edition), or The Poseidon Adventure (Special Edition).
It's definitely not as entertaining as Volcano, Armageddon or The
Perfect Storm. 10.5 is middle-of-the-barrel fare. Except I'll tell
you what, shopworn and cliché-ridden this movie might be, but once
I tuned in, it was real hard to stop watching. It's like candy corn
- you know it's not good for you, you'll feel ashamed in the
morning, and you might wake up with nausea. But so what? One
hallmark of disaster films is the all-star cast, something which
10.5 is lacking, with due respect to Beau Bridges, John Schneider
and Fred Ward. However, I caught this mini-series when it first
came out primarily because of Kim Delaney, whose Detective Diane
Russell I really dug in NYPD BLUE. Dr. Samantha Hill is actually a
pedestrian role, but I still think that Delaney does a fine job
with what she's given. Much as she did with Det. Russell, Delaney
is able to bring out the wounded vulnerability within the icy,
brilliant Sam Hill. Certainly, the movie is at its most interesting
whenever she's on camera.
Everything you expect to see crops up sooner or later. The citywide
panic. The mass evacuations. The refugee camps. The Californian
coastline getting a face lift, and there's some irony there. Also
the cheesy dialogue and the personal little dramas which are
supposed to provide a humanizing counterpoint to the impersonal
awesomeness of Mother Nature. Delaney and John Schneider are good.
The other actors vary from decent to derivative. 10.5 does try to
switch things up a bit by using various editing tricks, from split
frames to jittery close-ups (I was half expecting Jack Bauer to
show up somewhere). I will say that these techniques do lend the
story a sharper sense of immediacy.
For those interested and willing to sit thru 2 hours 45 minutes of
talk, the 10.5 dvd does come with a director's audio commentary.
Anyways, 10.5 was good for the ratings and drew in enough viewers
that a made-for-television sequel 10.5: Apocalypse came out in
2006, in which Kim Delaney returns but the cheesy is even more in
the hizzy. And yet 10.5: APOCALYPSE isn't the worst disaster film
of all tme. That honor probably falls on a stinker like AVALANCHE,
KRAKATOA - EAST OF JAVA, or JAWS THE REVENGE. SON OF THE MASK, by
the way, also counts as a disaster film.
