Aftershock: Earthquake in New York

upon turning on my television set to relax with a fine made-for-tv movie, i stumbled upon this. perhaps it was fate, or perhaps it was simply nothing more than a bit of luck on my behalf, but i must say, first and foremost that i was immediately blown away. the movie drew me in with its top-notch special effects and intriguing character situations--needless to say, for approximately 170 minutes i forgot entirely of any relatives or close friends i may have. instead, i was living the adventure--no, i WAS the adventure. and i can, with the truest of intentions say, that while watching this movie i was the happiest i have ever been in my entire life. and, more than likely, it was the happiest i will ever be. even now, on dreary afternoons when i find myself alone with nothing to do, i like to sit back with a fine, cool glass of lemonade and compile stanza upon stanza of poetry in my head encompassing the various scenes and events, making the movie ever-mine and something that will live forever within my memories.

I bought this on DVD because it was cheap and I couldn't find anything else, but I pretty much thought it would be wasted money. But this movie is surprisingly well written, effective and does its best to avoid disaster movie clichés, albeit not always successful. Like its predecessor "EarthQuake" it focuses on the effect of a disastrous earthquake on the lives of several groups of people whom struggle to survive and find loved ones amongst the devastation. The stories range in degrees of interests, ranging from engrossing to rather weak and familiar. The one that stands out the most is about a pampered rich girl and a young Russian taxi driver whom takes it upon himself to protect her. The contrast is interesting as she finds herself in a totally alien world of sudden death and chaos while her companion seems wearily used to such calamities, and instead of panicking he immediately tries to regain control of their situation. As far as the special effects go it doesn't have all the flashy effects other quake movies do but what it does show is pretty convincing, they seemed to realize their own production limitations and wisely try worked around them without pushing it too far. 7 out of 10, escapes the "made for TV" curse and is overall worth viewing.

OK. The genre "disaster film" genrally doesn't mean earth-shattering, brilliant writing. What these movies are all about is the ACTION-something that, i'm pleased to see, the other commenters on this page realize. This movie, i think, has some better writing than others. It sidesteps cliched characters to a certain extent...for example, the mayor is sympathetic and really NOT a mad power-monger. It was refreshing for me to see a person in a position of power in an action movie attempt not to abuse such power for his/her own interests. All the other characters are also appealing...except one. As for the direction, Mikael Salomon truly knows how to stage action...it's all about camera angles. In this film, he uses these to great effect...my personal favorite being the one he uses when 2 characters escape out from under a truck collapsing underground in the nick of time. all-in-all, this is an entertaining movie...and a worthy entry into the disaster-film genre. in fact, i like this better than VOLCANO, a theatrical release from a few years back. i give this movie 3 out of 4 stars.

I watched this on TV, and all I can say is that it was an awesome movie, with incredible special effects and more than the other stories of destruction, a believable plot line. I saw that movie is available on video tape, but I'd personally wait for a DVD. I know it probably will never get made in that format, but it would be one that i'd buy!!

I first read Chuck Scarboroughs' novel "Aftershock" in 1996 or 97. Having grown up in NY as a child, I was familiar was Scarborough from his anchoring the local Eyewitness news for WNBC ch 4. I thoroughly enjoyed the novel, to the point that I reread it several times since. The piece of crap that aired on CBS bore no relation to the novel other than the fact that an earthquake struck the City of New York. Many subplots were missing, characters were added (i.e., the Russian cabbie [who the hell was he?]. I have wished that I could locate Chuck Scarboroughs' address and ask him how he could have greenlighted this garbage.