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Category 6: Day of Destruction

Category 6: Day of Destruction (2004) Movie Poster
  •  USA  •    •  175m  •    •  Directed by: Dick Lowry.  •  Starring: Thomas Gibson, Nancy McKeon, Chandra West, Brian Markinson, Nancy Anne Sakovich, Randy Quaid, Dianne Wiest, Brian Dennehy, Ari Cohen, Christopher Shyer, Arnold Pinnock, Chad Willett, Hollis McLaren.  •  Music by: Jeff Rona, Joseph Williams.
        As chief meteorologist for the National Weather Service's Storm Prediction Center, Andy Goodman has seen his share of storms. Now, just days shy of his eagerly anticipated retirement, Goodman is disturbed to discover three separate storm fronts approaching Chicago: a cluster of tornados from the west, a warm storm front from the south, and an Arctic system from the north. As Goodman enlists the aid of his longtime storm-chasing friend "Tornado Tommy" in tracking the storms, ambitious Chicago television reporter Amy Harkin is busy researching the mysterious drought and record heat wave that has plagued the city for nearly six weeks. Though the citizens of Chicago are warned to reduce their energy consumption by secretary of energy Shirley Abbott the Windy City is thrust into darkness when severe thunderstorms destroy the city's main power-generating plant. With no means to warn the outside world of the dangers fast approaching, Harkin and Midwest Electric chief of operations Mitch Benson must race against time to get the word out to citizens and emergency workers before the snowballing blackout causes a complete collapse of the entire North American power grid.

Trailers:

   Length:  Languages:  Subtitles:
 1:57
 
 
 0:39
 
 

Review:

Image from: Category 6: Day of Destruction (2004)
Image from: Category 6: Day of Destruction (2004)
Image from: Category 6: Day of Destruction (2004)
Image from: Category 6: Day of Destruction (2004)
Image from: Category 6: Day of Destruction (2004)
Image from: Category 6: Day of Destruction (2004)
Image from: Category 6: Day of Destruction (2004)
Image from: Category 6: Day of Destruction (2004)
Image from: Category 6: Day of Destruction (2004)
Image from: Category 6: Day of Destruction (2004)
Image from: Category 6: Day of Destruction (2004)
Image from: Category 6: Day of Destruction (2004)
Image from: Category 6: Day of Destruction (2004)
Image from: Category 6: Day of Destruction (2004)
Image from: Category 6: Day of Destruction (2004)
Image from: Category 6: Day of Destruction (2004)
Image from: Category 6: Day of Destruction (2004)
I hope that Matt Dorff's original script for this was much better (there are signs of it - dialogue that should happen well before big fx scenes (to introduce characters) that would make sense much earlier, is jammed in later in the time-line; perhaps the original script was for a longer running-time. But maybe not -- in any case, this reeks. Every character is uninteresting, and everybody speaks expository passages as if they are speaking the word of god. There are characters that are entirely expository -- Dianne Wiest's "Secretary Abbot" is just awful, explaining things to her assistant (and incidentally us), in endless speeches that NO ONE would say to anyone, ever, in real life (when she isn't explaining things to her assistant that she already knows, her assistant explains things to HER that SHE already knows._ There are characters who are entirely one-dimensional -- the evil power company guy; the pilot who will just NOT SHUT UP about his personal life and concentrate on his job. The "well-meaning" power-company superdooperuber hacker-guy who can crash

everything in Chicago (including the phones) -- and then gives the oh-no-what-have-I- done speech (but not leave himself a back door?). The crusading reporter who abandons her principles at the drop of a hat? The power-company shift supervisor who ABANDONS HIS POST in the middle of the worst crisis in Chicago since the Fire -- with no consequences? Hospitals ABANDONED by the doctors and nurses during the crisis (I'm not kidding, that's in the movie.)

Oh yeah, and it's filled with Hollywood morality clichés -- generally women are good, men are evil, unless influenced by a woman (the ultimate is the punk with the gun -- deprived of a woman's influence, he literally goes insane); an evil stupid act (like what the reporter did with hacker-bozo) is all right, so long as you 'mean well'. Evil men die, capitalist evil men die as horribly as possible, everybody else lives (well, except Randy Quaid). And did I hear someone say that the nuclear electrical power generating stations had to shut down because there wasn't electricity to run the safety systems (think about that one)?

There is one ray of sunshine (if you'll pardon the expression) -- Randy Quaid basically plays his character from "Independence Day" (you know -- "Hello boys - I'm baaaack!") -- this time as a storm chaser with an infinite-range SUV and superdooper batteries for his camcorders. Nevertheless, they kill him -- mostly, it seems, so that the audience will appreciate that tornados are pretty dangerous things (kinda shallow, that.).


Review by Charles McGrew from the Internet Movie Database.