Main Cast: Craig T. Nelson, Bonnie Bedelia, Richard Farnsworth, Jürgen Prochnow, Louise Fletcher
Release Year: 1993
Country: US
Run Time: 195 minutes
Plot
This ecological drama, set in 2017, presents a world where pollution has generated ever more unpredictable weather and rendered large chunks of the planet into disaster zones. After a hurricane destroys everything they've built for themselves, Louisiana shrimp fisherman Drew Morgan (Craig T. Nelson) and his family, including wife Suzanne (Bonnie Bedelia), flee through a series of refugee camps to upstate New York, where Drew's estranged former business partner Larry Richter (Jurgen Prochnow) -- who has designs on Suzanne -- lives in comfort and affluence. Along the way, Drew loses his daughter, Linnie (Ashley Jones), to an agrarian doomsday cult; watches his elderly father (Richard Farnsworth) suffer a stroke; and almost drives away his confused oldest son, Paul (Justin Whalin). When Larry offers to shelter Drew's family if Drew himself will leave, Suzanne and the kids rally behind him. Things go awry, however, when an attempt to smuggle themselves across the border ends with Craig washed up on Canadian shores and the rest of the family stranded and penniless back in America. Originally presented as a two-part miniseries, The Fire Next Time premiered on CBS on April 18 and 20, 1993. The movie has no connection to the James Baldwin book of the same name. ~ Brian J. Dillard, All Movie Guide
Review
This better-than-average TV miniseries uses global warming as the backdrop to disaster-flick spectacle, social commentary, and family melodrama. The contrast between gated utopian communities and endless competing dystopian nightmares gives The Fire Next Time an air of science fiction authority; plenty of the horrors the characters endure already occur all over the planet, just not usually to nice middle-class American families. Director Tom McLoughlin, a horror veteran, and screenwriter James Henerson, a frequent TV scribe, acquit themselves admirably in the scenes that focus on epic storms, civil unrest, refugee camps, looters, and profiteers; they aren't as convincing with the soap-opera stuff. Bonnie Bedelia and Craig T. Nelson, however, do their best to enliven the sometimes clichéd emotional dynamics in a script that tends to wring its hands whenever the action slows. Lots of first-rate talent also enlivens the supporting cast, especially Louise Fletcher as a beatific huckster, folksinger Odetta as a hymn-singing refugee, and Marla Gibbs as a kindly relief worker. Richard Farnsworth and Jurgen Prochnow get saddled with, respectively, a doddering oldster and an effete villain role, but they attack their parts with typical professionalism. If only the script didn't give so many talented actors such mawkish dialogue to recite, The Fire Next Time would be top-shelf instead of just acceptable. ~ Brian J. Dillard, All Movie Guide
Marla Gibbs; Ashley Jones; Sal Lopez; Odette; Shawn Toovey; Justin Whalin; Charles Haid
Credit
Sally Jane Jackson - Casting, Ross Brown - Casting, Mary West - Casting, Donna M. Belajac - Casting, Karen Lecorgne - Casting, Syd Mead - Consultant/advisor, Van Broughton Ramsey - Costume Designer, James Echerd - Costume Designer, Robert J. Wilson - First Assistant Director, Jonathan Giles Zimmerman - First Assistant Director, Tom McLoughlin - Director, Jack Gill - Second Unit Director, Chalres Bornstein - Editor, Robert Halmi, Jr. - Executive Producer, James Henerson - Executive Producer, Roxanne Yahyavi - Hair Styles, Gerrit Van Der Meer - Line Producer, Laurence Rosenthal - Composer (Music Score), Melanie Hughes - Makeup, Don Devine - Camera Operator, William Strom - Production Designer, Shelly Johnson - Cinematographer, Edwin Self - Producer, Brit Warner - Sound Mixer, Jack Gill - Stunts, Gerrit Van Der Meer - Unit Production Manager, Jan Foster - Unit Production Manager, James Henerson - Screenwriter, Philip Lee - Second Unit Director Of Photography, Mary Jo Markey - Associate Editor, Terry Hall - Gaffer, Njeri Karago - Post Production Supervisor, Nanette Guidebeck - Production Coordinator, Chris Pewarchik-Call - Properties Master, David E. Campbell - Re-Recording Mixer, Rick Ash - Re-Recording Mixer, Dean A. Zupancic - Re-Recording Mixer, Diane Durant-Kelly - Script Supervisor, Pamela Kuri - Second Assistant Director, James Reedy - Special Effects Coordinator, J. Ben Sykes - Casting Assistant, Cheri Reed - Costumes Supervisor, Lisa Alexander - First Assistant Editor, James M. Schneider - Set Decorator, Larry Strichman - Co-Executive Producer, Michael E. Edmonson - Special Effects Foreman
