User reviews

Lightning: Fire from the Sky is the first of two Lightning themed movies that will have inevitably have been making the rounds on the Scyfy channel.

It stars Dukes Of Hazard/Smallville alumni John Schneider, industry veteran Stacy Keach and hollywood star Jesse Eisenberg.

It tells the story of a young man with a fascination for lightning (How convenient) who begins to see evidence that a 100yr storm is on its way to his town. But who can he convince and what can he do to combat it?

It's all your usual cliched all the way to hell, predictible, naff looking and all by the numbers stuff but to be fair I've seen a lot worse.

What makes this rise above mediocrity is the cast, those three and the supporting faces do a decent enough job that manages to mask some the movies obvious flaws.

Generic stuff, but passable in its own way.

The Good:

Cast do a good job

Some really good writing in places

The Bad:

Cliched to hell

Ending is really dumb

Things I Learnt From This Movie:

Eisenberg truly did find greatness, from small beginnings

The "Little Wesley" character from Star Trek is renamed and played by a new actor in LIGHTNING: FIRE FROM THE SKY -- a 2001 made-for-TV movie.

Here, Little Wesley has superior knowledge about weather patterns and dangerous thunder clouds. LIGHTNING burdens our boy genius with an assortment of ignorant adults who will forever fail to grasp the fact that Wesley is always right.

The lead victims of LIGHTNING are veteran actors John Schneider and Stacy Keach who both deserve better treatment.

With camera point-of-view and editing, the director attempted to give the thunder clouds a "personality" (for lack of a better word). It is a stretch and ended up being a distraction to the viewer.

This made-for-TV movie has little going for it and is best avoided.

as disaster movies,this is pretty awful.poor acting all around,especially from the woman who played the town mayor.judging by her performance,i'm guessing she thought she was in a comedy.nobody did a good job in their roles,except maybe John Schnieder,who was not too bad and Michelle Greene was okay.as for the rest,there isn't a convincing one in the lot.i was so embarrassed for them all.but to be fair,some of the dialogue they were given is atrocious.not much thought went into this film.1 positive though is that the lightning scenes were done well,and were almost impressive at times.the story itself moves way too slow,with pointless scene after pointless scene.this movie is not worth your time,unless you want to laugh at bad acting.the movie is supposed to be serious,and is not played for camp value,at all,and that is the real disaster.

I like lightning and storms but this movie bombed in every way. This should probably be rated a 1 but I give it a 2 for effort. Lots of explosions and things burning but soooooo many errors and just stupidity on the characters. Could of been worse but barely. You have three things in this movie, Hysterics, Monotone Emotions and things blowing up that wouldn't happen in reality not to mention the stupidity.

This has a lot of people just standing and or waiting for the something to happen. Lots of inaction or just stupid actions. You have two storms that are converging on a town while the areas around it are getting hit as well yet nobody does anything but a teen that's obsessed with storms and even that is much of nothing but sending a warning by setting of the towns storm sirens when it's too late.

You would of expected this from a movie from the 50's or 60's but for 2001, this bombed in every way. The special effects were lights and explosions when things would melt rather than explode and if this amount of electricity kept hitting the power grid, the relay stations would've blown. This is a 100 year storm that supposedly has the potential to last forever if something isn't done to stop it. That something, blowing up a fuel depot in the hopes of heat breaking the storm.

Not sure who they were trying to reach but this, besides watching things go boom, was grueling to watch. You even had some great actors that had potential but nope, even they bombed. You have the screamers and the rest were so monotone it was boring to watch. Save yourself the time and just watch something, anything else.

NOT the best acting, but the special effects were the highlight. Far above normal for these type of movies. John Schneider & Stacy Keach do well in their roles, but as far as acting goes I vote for Gary Sandy's (WKRP In Cincinnati) performance. I just fell in love with his character. His character fit the small town man that you would enjoy drinking coffee with. Science looks like it took a back seat here on logic, but I could be wrong. The ending just seemed too unbelievable and convenient. The stats are correct for the most part as well as advise on being in electric storms. You don't think they used FEDMART in place of WALMART, do you?

Look, there aren't as many titties in this movie as I usually like. However, the storyline was gripping. The suspense buildup was almost legendary. I stayed up all night thinking about what flaws I could highlight for this movie. Then I realized, there aren't any. It was simply one of the greatest movies I ever watched, even though there weren't any titties. I highly recommend you watch it as well unless that is, you also like titties. And you would realize they're just aren't any in this movie. Also, how did Jesse Eisenberg ever become famous. He is an insufferable little brat In this movie. And he also appears to be an insufferable brat in real life. Good Lord. Anyway, enjoy.

This movie is quite unrealistic. Obviously the story writers didn't bother collect information on weather phenomena. The big problem with colliding weather system isn't lightning but torrential rains accompanied with floodings, and strong storms, even tornados. It is also obsolete that a boy would find out more about the weather than the weather forecasting organisations like the NOAA and others. There are so many exciting scenarios for weather-related disasters--so why did they choose something so unrealistic?

This film would be perfect. Even without commentary, it's so stupidly hillarious it's worth watching. Clearly directed by some kind of partially trained monkey and edited by his cousin. While it starts a bit slow, it quickly kicks in with various scenes of lightning mischief. Who ever know lighting could go so slow!? Highly recommended!

And Family Friendly wins. There are times some things have to become compromises when you make a movie, and sometimes you have to compromise on the theme to fit a market.

But unless you are setting up a pure fantasy you should not have to compromise on believability. In this feature, in an attempt pump up the dramatic side at the same time they tried to remain family friendly, lighting was made to "jump through hoops" (sorry about the pun) and things were happening that simply do not happen in the real world. This story had promise, this movie had potential. The direction was fitting, the photography was acceptable, the editing, acting, sound-- all made the grade. Unfortunately, like a wonderful house built on an inadequate foundation, it cracks and falls apart as it ages.

So much potential.

Prime Video offers "Lightning: Fire from the Sky" (2001) which has all the flavor of a family-centered Hallmark movie. If you like this style of film, this one's for you.

The storyline connects two magnetic storm colliding over Rutland, a cozy small town near St. Louis. A 16-year-old would-be meteorologist seems to be the only person who can chart these storms, so, acting on his own, he sets off the town sirens as lightning ravages just about everything from telephone poles to toasters.

It's a bit corny, a bit funny, a bit nuclear family, but I looked past these issues and found it worth the time. I give it 3/5 Stars.