Hoo-boy, you take a chance on an Indie film and you get burned, big time. Well, what else did I expect from “On Fire,” huh? I’ll tell you this much: the film never lit up the screen figuratively and left me burning for, literally, anything else.
I would never have imagined being anxious to watch PAW Patrol: The Mighty Movie, but there I was, huh?
Thankfully short, and yet an ironic eternity at 80 minutes, On Fire tells the story of a family too stupid to imagine disaster could affect them and then proving too obstinate to take emergency instructions seriously … and this is the family we are rooting for.
Dave Laughlin (co-director/star Peter Facinelli) is a family man living, essentially, in a large stationary trailer in the woods. His son is in high school; his wife is eight months pregnant; his ailing father (Lance Henrikson) is a jerk. Like 99% of Americans, he has issues with health care coverage. And like the vast majority of Americans, he has almost certainly never considered that universal health care could solve them. No, go ahead Laughlin family, complain about your health care without ever considering why you have health care bills when so many peer countries do not. Cuz they’re wealthier than you? Uh … no. That’s not it.
A wildfire is reported a town over. There’s nothing but a wall of trees between the Laughlin shack and the flames, but I’m sure it will die out, right? I mean global warming isn’t a thing and there’s no recent history of out-of-control wildfires anywhere in North America, right? I tell you what, why don’t just prove the fire isn’t there? I’m sure you can find something on the web to support that thesis. And it works out great for the philosophy of red voters.
To tell the truth, I have no idea where the political sympathies of this film lie. I don’t the picture was made with enough skill to have any. But I do know that if you’re buying fire prevention supplies on the day of a major event and the store is empty, you are well behind the learning curve. This proves double when the call for town evacuation goes out and Dave is still in the hardware store.
This is my favorite part … the Laughlins are a two-car family and instead of Dave waiting for his fam to come to him away from the fire, he insists upon getting them, even abusing a contrary police order in the process. Go, “Alpha Male,” Go! And good thing, too, cuz pregnant Sarah (Fiona Dourif) has
crashed the car, killing gramps in the process. Oh well; he was an asshole. And his medical bills were starting to add up.
So the film becomes Dave rescuing his crashed fam, going back to the house then waiting until the fire is right upon them and then and only then trying to escape the wildfire. And the acting consistently says, “TV movie.” The plot also says, “TV movie.” The relationships, too, say, “TV movie.” In fact, I’m surprised I saw this in a theater.
Actually, this film feels not so much like a TV Movie as one of those awful Christian propaganda dramas except for the part where God missed the turn-off onto the screenplay. And then it feels a lot like Hillbilly Elegy, where an undercurrent of RW and Libertarian idiocy plagues whatever good might be in the film. I don’t think On Fire is well enough made to be as aggravating as Hillbilly Elegy. Ain’t nobody gaining political office as a result of this dreck. As a Californian and someone who has lost everything in a wildfire, I could be sympathetic to the subjects of this film, I’m just … not. And the reason is simple: none of your actions resemble common sense, or even the desperate human survival instinct you wish to portray. No, you guys strike me as Darwin Award runners-up. Failures for lack of execution. I want to believe there’s a happy ending in that you all survived (except for asshole gramps, of course), but now your life after film is one of guaranteed financial Hell. It doesn’t have to be that way. Really.
There once was a man named Dave
Who tweren’t no dern safety slave
When fire came a roarin’
“Oh yeah! Problems I been ignorin’ “
If he’s lucky, there will be someone left to save
Rated PG-13, 80 Minutes
Director: Peter Facinelli, Nick Lyon
Writer: Nick Lyon, Ron Peer
Genre: Made-for-TV theater movies
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: Obstinate fools
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: “Psst … ACT! ACT!”
