Classic Horrors Club

Disaster Film Checklist

• All-Star Cast (Oscar Winners):
  • Ernest Borgnine
  • Patty Duke
• All-Star Cast (Emmy Winner):
  • Lloyd Nolan
• All-Star Cast (Others):
  • Vera Miles
  • Alex Cord
  • Donna Mills
  • Neville Brand
  • Ty Hardin
  • Gene Evans
  • Erik Estrada
• Multiple Lives in Danger:
  • Citizens of Silverton, Oregon
  • Wagner Lodge
  • Brisbane Lumber Mill
• Threat Beyond Control:
  • Forest fire
• Characters and Relationships:
  • Sam Brisbane is in love with the widow, Martha Wagner, but she’ll soon regret not reciprocating.
  • The marriage of Dr. Alex Wilson and Dr. Peggy Wilson is on the rocks, each wanting to move to a different city for their respective careers.
  • Larry Durant and Frank are prison buddies plotting an escape when they’re called to assist in fighting the fire. (Durant started the fire, by the way, by flicking a lit cigarette.)
• Mental Handicaps & Phobias:
  • Harriett Malone is the teacher responsible for the busload of elementary school children from which little Judy wandered away. She can’t bear the guilt and nearly dies from it.
• Daring Rescue:
  • Little Judy wanders into the burning woods near Shadybrook Meadow, then passes out in a gulley. Sam Brisbane and Dr. Alex Wilson tie a rope to their vehicle and scale down the side of the hill to save her.
• Brave Sacrifice:
  • After pushing a burning tree out of the way, Sam Brisbane’s vehicle bursts into flames and tumbles over the edge of a cliff.
• Survival of Babies and/or Pets:
  • Dan Harter picks up a rabbit from the burning woods and places it inside his jacket. Later, he releases it (at the burning lumber mill.)
• Violation of Laws of Physics Requiring Suspension of Disbelief:
  • The top of a tree burns when none of the trees around it are on fire.
• Theme:
  • Power of nature
• Bonus:
  • As the wind changes, the areas that are threatened keep changing.

Thoughts

On one hand, Fire (1977) is a retread of Flood (1976) from the year before. They were even produced and directed by the same team of Irwin Allen (the former) and Earl Bellamy (the latter.) The names of the writers, though, may have been changed to protect the innocent… Don Ingalls wrote Flood and Norman Katkov and Arthur Weiss wrote Fire. Both are uncynical and the characters have no disagreements about how to prevent disaster or dramatic confrontations about their disagreements. For the most part, the characters are good-natured and willing to help each other survive.

Sam Brisbane (Ernest Borgnine) is the MVP in this one. He’s here, there, and everywhere doing what he can. But he always has the lodge and his beloved Martha Wagner (Vera Miles) in mind. Borgnine is no stranger to danger, having crash landed in The Flight of the Phoenix (1965) and been covered by rats in Willard (1971.) However, it was his wife, not him, that died in The Poseidon Adventure (1972.) He’s very good in this and it’s sad when he dies saving those he helped rescue from the lodge.

Not mentioned above is helicopter pilot Bill Clay (James W. Gavin.) Early in the film, he mentions that he can’t wait to get out of the helicopter flying business, which means something’s going to facilitate that for him. Sure enough, his engine sputters, the copter spins, and he crashes into the burning woods. He survives, but he’s blind. Not only does this provide him with a resolution, it also provides escaped prisoner Frank (Erik Estrada) an opportunity to help him, thereby redeeming himself. As he tells him, “You win. I lose.”

Although it’s a rule that children don’t die, little Bobby (actor unknown) probably should have. As the lodge burns, he hides under the bed, somehow locking the bedroom door so that Martha can’t open it. She finally persuades him to come to the door, but he doesn’t even know how to open it! She asks, “Can you pinch the little bar in the doorknob?” Between his hijinks and little Judy getting lost in the woods, Fire could be shown to married couples as an unorthodox method of birth control.

Late in the movie, there’s a scene that probably belongs in a larger scale disaster than this. The citizens of Silverton run down the street as flames reach toward the sky. It’s as if Godzilla has come to Oregon. But then mere moments later, Dan Harter (Gene Evans) announces, “The fire’s under control! It’s almost out!” Really? What happened to suddenly give the firefighters an advantage over Mother Nature? The situation is now as harmless as this movie and we can all witness a beautiful sunset.