Leofwine_draca THE GREAT LOS ANGELES EARTHQUAKE is a TV movie exploration of a familiar topic: an earthquake striking a large metropolis, as seen in EARTHQUAKE and SAN ANDREAS. The problem with this film is that it runs no less than three hours, and it has absolutely no reason to do so. The plot is more than familiar from pretty much every other disaster movie you can think of, with an expert scientist predicating an upcoming disaster but ending up disbelieved by everybody around her. Meanwhile various other assorted characters are introduced, from reporters to cops, government officials and ordinary people. The earthquake itself doesn't strike until more than two hours of the running time has passed, although the special effects are decent and there's some good drama arising from the situation. But this really didn't need to be three hours.

DaveHasNoTimeForAnyOfThisBull Joanna Kerns is the sister who takes care of her family andworks hard studying earthquakes, which she predicts will happen soon. Her sister is played by Lindsey Frost whose hormones are going through the roof, symbolically like an earthquake, in this movie. Dr. Claire Winslow (Kerns) has arguments with her sister, her mother, her husband, and her daughter, all leading up to the big earthquake. More people should of died than in the movie. This movie was a year after the SF bay area earthquake and was made to take advantage of the fear that there would be another one in California soon. I'm an Earthquake freak. Oddly enough we have had several small ones in the past year and that leads me to believe there will be a bigger one in the coming months. They have been growing in size and that is a guarantee that a big one is coming. Overall the movie is good, well acted, and interesting. It's the best damn earthquake movie I've seen, period.

lionel.willoquet Convinced that an earthquake is going to destroy Los Angeles, a seismologist tries to alert the authorities of the city and the population. Traced on " films disaster ", this fiction turns out without surprises.

Teach-8 Once more, Los Angeles is the target of a large M8+ earthquake; however, scientifically, this one was much more believable than the megaquake on the San Andreas fault in "Earthquake" (1974). However, the plot on the original 4-hour TV movie was way too complicated, and in parts, irrelevant. When a three-hour version was released later, it was clear that the cut parts--centered around the visit and assassination attempt on a foreign head of state, even after the city is in ruins afterwards--had contributed nothing to the movie as a whole. Though still weak, the plot did show the problems with earthquake prediction and dealing with the real world. The attempt to hush-up the threat of an earthquake to the Los Angeles area was real after the Long Beach earthquake of 1933 and for the same reason--money. The reaction to a prediction was quite believable as well--much panic, which then adversely affects those that keep their heads. Overall, a good movie--not great, but certainly interesting.