Dante's Peak is a disaster thriller movie directed by Roger Donaldson and stars Pierce Brosnan, Linda Hamilton, Charles Hallahan, Jeremy Foley and Jamie Renee Smith in the leads.

After seeing the movie I was surprised to such low rating of the movie on IMDb as the movie deserves much better rating.

The plot of the movie is predictable but execution is good. The best part of the movie is that it doesn't wastes much time in plot development.

Pierce Brosnan and Linda Hamilton both are seasoned actors and it shows in their performance. Rest of the actors were also good.

The screenplay is good but the pace is uneven as either it gets fast or gets slow. Cinematography is good and specially the scenes of volcanic eruption is fascinating although some scenes looks dramatic.

The movie is not that bad as rated by few and is an enjoyable experience.

Disaster movies can be a fun way to spend some time idle, although most are not particularly cinematically remarkable. This movie fits that description well. The action takes place in a small rural village that has just been considered a great place to live in the US, but lives in the shadow of a sleeping volcano. What no one knows is that this volcano appears to be in full swing and threatens to explode.

The movie quickly creates tension among the audience, and it serves well to grab our attention. I am not the best person to judge the script's ability to be true to the scientific facts underlying a volcanic eruption, I just accept what I saw tacitly, but I admit the possibility the film is not very true to science. The initial half is slower and the action is concentrated on the final half, which is basically a race to escape the volcano. There are some loose ends and inconsistent details, like that scene where a girl, who doesn't even reach the car's pedals, can drive off in a 4-4 jeep.

Pierce Brosnan was convincing in his starring role, while Linda Hamilton made an effort but is always in his shadow. Either way, they are the ones who leverage the movie. The volcano, as it happens in such cases, is almost a character in its own right. Technically, the film was entitled to the best sound and special effects that existed in 1997... but the quick advances in film make it look old-fashioned to many today. Personally, I liked what I saw.

It's not an excellent movie and it's far from being the life movie of anyone involved, it has a dubious script and unbelievable scenes where (as always happens in these movies) some characters escapes from death by a hair. But it's still one of the best disaster movies of the late 1990s, it's fun and entertains the public well.

Yes, "Dante's Peak" is entertaining; Watching it for the third time around, I had to laugh at some of the parts I hadn't picked up on or had forgotten from my two previous viewing experiences. Pierce Brosnan and Linda Hamilton, two action/adventure stars, do little to expand their acting abilities. The rest of the cast doesn't give us much more than panicked looks, with the exception of Brosnan's boss, who does give a somewhat believable reasons to not take news of an impending volcano burst seriously. The kids aren't impressive and the manipulative script wants us to worry about their fate. The grandmother (Elizabeth Hoffman, mother of the "Sisters" TV clan) and her dog live up on a lake near the mountain, and it is her refusal to leave her home which causes the kids and the adult leads to stay behind while the rest of the town is escaping, most to no avail.

There are genuine moments of suspense, such as watching the force of the massive earthquake which hits the town while the volcano in the background is showing off its smokey exterior. Then, we get a massive volcano cloud which chases the two adults and the kids into a mine, supposedly part of the mountain range connected to Dante's Peak. There is also an impressive raging river scene where Brosnan's crew attempt to escape. One of the victims gives such a convincing look of knowing his fate that it is even more horrific than watching them go through it. Seeing this film sadly made me think of those victims of 9/11 and the horror they faced, so at least the film had one memorable impact on me. However, if Hollywood ever dares to make a 9/11 survival story, I hope we don't get the type of disaster epic they do here. No forced romances, no over emotional kids to force the tears out, but just real people dealing with a horrific situation. Had "Dante's Peak" not tried for 30's style pathos, it could have worked; Survival by itself is a gripping story that you don't need to add those cliches.

The same year of "Dante's Peak", we also got "Volcano", which gave me unintentional chuckles in the theatre I saw it at (the Beverly Center) because that same shopping center was demolished in it, as were several local buildings I see almost every day. While both films were silly in many ways, I enjoyed "Dante's Peak" more for its colorful country photography. Hollywood has not had a great time doing volcano movies; "The Last Days of Pompeii" (1935) is a small budgeted epic which is fun because of the cliches of the time it was made; "Krakatowa, East of Java" (1969) is even sillier because it was obviously filmed backwards (according to Leonard Maltin, Krakatowa is actually WEST of Java!). The all-time worst is "When Time Ran Out" (1980),Irwin Allen's final disaster epic in which the cast was as boring as the subplots they had to deal with, and even the volcano explosions were unmemorable. My favorite volcano movie by far has to be "The Devil at 6 O'Clock" (1961) with Spencer Tracy and Frank Sinatra. While I haven't seen it in some time, I recall it with fondness, at least compared to the five other movies I have mentioned. At least "Dante's Peak" has some laughs for the ridiculous twists which come throughout. If you can look at it with tongue-in-cheek and not take it too seriously beyond the I'm-determined-to-survive plot, you may have a good time. While I'm sure some folks did cry at the overly use of cymbols in the finale, I found myself crying, too---that is from too much unintentional laughter!