Top 45 Scariest Natural Disaster Movies
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#shortdrama #ceodrama #drama #revenge #fullmovie #englishsub #reelshort #dramabox #miniseries #love #betrayal #drama2026
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00:06Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're counting down our picks for the most
00:10destructive examples of disastrous cinema, barring those that feature
00:14biological or alien invasion plot lines. There may be some human-made elements to
00:19some of these disasters, but the main crisis is basically natural.
00:22Don't panic! You're off my back!
00:27Number 45. Flood.
00:29No sweat. It's tough to leak.
00:32Nothing.
00:33You just panicked, that's all. I'd like to x-ray inside that violet dirt.
00:37Let's have a look at the hills. Worry, worry, worry.
00:41The 1970s weren't only a halcyon decade for the disaster movie, but it was also the era when
00:46made-for-television movies ruled the airwaves. Flood, from 1976, was actually produced for
00:51the medium by Erwin Allen, an absolute legend of the disaster movie genre, whose legacy
00:56included the Poseidon adventure and the towering Inferno.
01:09Flood may not offer up anything new to fans of this well-worn genre, but it does bring
01:14some star power to the small screen, including Roddy McDowell, Barbara Hershey, and Robert Culp
01:19from I Spy. The end results feel perfectly nostalgic for those who remember growing
01:24up with these kinds of TV films, while also providing all of the expected thrills and drama.
01:29Stand by. We have emergency service on an open line. OAS inquires if the dam is broken.
01:35Yes, the dam broke. It's wiped out three-quarters of this town. We don't even know how many
01:39casualties. What we need is medicine, food, blankets, drinking water. It's called help.
01:45Tell them.
01:46I'll tell them.
01:47Number 44. Hard Rain.
01:49Look, we just want the money. You guys, you guys walk away. We won't kill you. Okay? How's that?
02:01There are a lot of plot elements going on in 1998's Hard Rain, storyline balls that are in the air
02:07amid
02:08the setting of a major deluge. This film combines elements of crime, drama, and disaster within a
02:13narrative that sets up an armored car heist in a small town that's dealing with rising floodwaters.
02:17Have you ever been robbed before?
02:21No. I've only been doing this a couple of months.
02:24Oh.
02:25Yeah, I used to, uh, sell construction machinery.
02:30Hard Rain boasts a strong cast, including Morgan Freeman and Christian Slater, and retains
02:36something of a cult following today, despite not doing too well during its initial box office run.
02:41Still, excavators of late 90s genre cinema could do worse than reinvestigating Hard Rain,
02:46warts and all, for a satisfying rewatch.
02:49The dam's gone. You've got to go.
02:53No!
02:55No!
02:57No!
02:59Number 43. The Savage Bees.
03:02Oh, please don't let this be happening.
03:10Please!
03:13This effort from 1976 was another made-for-television disaster film, one that did so well that it
03:19actually received a sequel titled Terror Out of the Sky two years later. The Savage Bees
03:24concerns itself with a swarm of crossbred bees attacking New Orleans during Mardi Gras. Utilizing
03:29that celebratory setting, the film takes the already-worn plot device of Jaws of balancing
03:34worries about scaring the populace with the issue of all of the deaths that can and do
03:39pile up.
03:40I repeat, killer bees, any loud noise can arise. Absolute quiet is necessary. Turn off all
03:48radio, all machinery, and get off the street.
03:51Of particular note is the film's ending climax, which cultivates a surprisingly effective amount
03:57of tension as the bees swarm a small car.
04:06Oh, Jeff! Jeff, help! Oh, please help!
04:12Number 42. Night of the Lepus.
04:22Are you one of those disaster movie fans that likes their genre affair silly or scary? How
04:27about a completely campy and ridiculous premise that's being treated totally straight by its
04:31cast? If you answered affirmatively to the latter, then might we suggest checking out
04:35Night of the Lepus from 1972? We say this knowing full well that the threat here is cute, gigantic,
04:41cuddly bunnies.
04:44Fire! There's some more!
04:51What makes Night of the Lepus such a unique watch, however, is the carnage that takes place
04:56during this hair-raising adventure. Pun intended. There's a surprising amount of gore for a PG
05:01film that would most certainly nab a PG-13 today. Meanwhile, the cast, which includes Psycho's
05:07Janet Leigh, all go completely nuts. It's great.
05:16Number 41. Meteor.
05:29Henry Fonda was no stranger to disaster movies, having often found himself working within genre
05:34parameters during the latter stages of his career. Meteor was one of those movies, like Rollercoaster
05:40and The Swarm, which has something of a cult status these days. This isn't only thanks to the presence
05:45of other A-list stars like Sean Connery and Natalie Wood within the cast, but also thanks to the
05:50exaggerated stakes at play.
05:51It is Sunday. Stay in your homes. Have faith. There is nothing we can do but wait.
06:02We will let you know when the danger is past.
06:05Meteor was based upon an actual report from MIT, one that described a potential disaster scenario from
06:11an invading meteorite heading towards Earth. The production was a troubled one to be sure,
06:15but still manages to deliver on the apocalyptic endgame scenarios that are part and parcel of the
06:20disaster movie genre.
06:33Number 40. Avalanche.
06:45It's sort of fitting that we list Meteor and Avalanche back-to-back, since that former film
06:50actually repurposed footage from the latter in order to complete production. Avalanche was also
06:55famously featured on an episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000, as Crow, Tom Servo, and the gang
07:00gently, and sometimes not so gently, needle this snow-covered valley of cinematic death.
07:05Has anyone seen my Jeanette?
07:08I'll see if I can find out.
07:10Jeanette? So many new characters. It's like the third season of Lost.
07:13Rock Hudson, Mia Farrow, Robert Forster, and more star in a story of developer negligence that results
07:19in a ski resort facing, you guessed it, an avalanche of epic proportions. It's something of a less
07:24mentioned name from the world of late 70s disaster movie goodies.
07:28Come on, boys. We got no time to lose.
07:33Come on.
07:36Come on, you guys. Hurry up. Move it.
07:39Number 39. Phase 4.
07:41People are dead back there.
07:43Yes. A tragedy. I don't understand it. They accepted the order. Why should they come here?
07:52Irrational behavior.
07:53Consider this cult flick from 1974 as an amalgamation of disaster movie and apocalyptic
07:59animal revenge. A world where the underground rises up from below to conquer humanity's dominant
08:05place on the food chain. Phase 4 was envisioned by legendary Hollywood graphic designer Saul Bass,
08:10an insanely creative voice who helped give cinematic life to these intelligent collaborative ant colonies.
08:31It's the cinematography of Dick Bush that perhaps serves as the true star of Phase 4, however,
08:36as the camera captures the scripted motivations of the ant invaders, lending them an honest and believable personality.
08:42Elsewhere, the dark and creepy musical score sets the perfect stage for a disaster movie quite
08:48unlike anything else you've ever seen.
08:51She's there. That hill. The queen.
08:56Pubs, you can't do it now. Come on. Come on.
08:58The queen!
08:59Number 38. Don't look up.
09:01A comet bigger than the asteroid that destroyed the dinosaurs is headed directly at Earth. If it isn't
09:06deflected, the entire planet dies. Wait, what did you just say? It's for a video game.
09:11The disaster movie genre has always been one where the typical formula is ripe for parody. Don't Look Up from
09:182021 deals with a potential catastrophic comet impact. It was just the latest in this line of meta-disaster pictures,
09:25a film that incorporates modern-day themes of conspiracy theories and climate change.
09:29They found a bunch of gold and diamonds and rare s*** on the comet. So they're gonna let it hit
09:37the planet to make a bunch of rich people even more disgustingly rich!
09:41There are a lot of comedic beats present within Don't Look Up, but the script from writer-director Adam McKay
09:47utilizes that pitch-black sense of humor alongside some end-of-the-world-level stakes.
09:52The end results are a film that works just as well as a commentary on disaster movies as it does
09:57existing within that same creative space.
10:00Dr. Mindy, the president's plan to save Earth and make it so we can all have a home is going
10:07to work, right?
10:09Every single man, woman, and child on this planet is going to die.
10:13I don't like him. He makes me sad.
10:16I'm sorry about that.
10:17Number 37, 13 Lives
10:19When the first boy gets through the long dive, I swim to you in rapport.
10:24Because if it's not working, how do we need to sit down before we bring you more out?
10:27But if it is working...
10:29Then we get on with it.
10:30They're packages.
10:32Or just the delivery of ours.
10:34We don't always associate stories of real-life rescues with the natural disaster genre of movies,
10:39but this is partly why Ron Howard's film 13 Lives works so well on screen.
10:43The director and screenwriter William Nicholson adapted the harrowing story of the Tam Luang cave rescue from 2018,
10:49a story of young boys and their assistant coach who all become trapped in a cave after it floods.
10:55We did.
11:00We did.
11:06This is to get out.
11:13Good work.
11:15The end results certainly felt up to Howard's standard as a filmmaker,
11:19enjoying a positive response from both movie fans and critics,
11:22who felt that 13 Lives handled the source material in strong fashion.
11:25All right, I guess it's our turn now.
11:28You go.
11:29You follow.
11:30Yeah.
11:31And remember, the current is much stronger than it was.
11:35Number 36, Arachnophobia.
11:52The Spielbergian touch that permeates Arachnophobia from 1990 thankfully dulls none of the bite from this super fun mashup of
11:59animal frights and natural disaster.
12:01Director Frank Marshall adapts a screenplay from Don Jacoby and Wesley Strick in fine fashion, balancing nice character moments with
12:08levity, charm, and yes, scares.
12:19Arachnophobia isn't only a film that affects those with a fear of bugs, but instead turns ordinary everyday situations into
12:25close calls with some deadly creepy crawlies.
12:27It also ends up being one of those movies from the early 90s that used to be everywhere, yet now
12:33seems to be missing from the cinema conversation.
12:36What is a musty, musty smell, moist, dark, no spiders, there's no spiders, there's dark, musty, a nest, a nest.
12:50Number 35, Deepwater Horizon.
12:53We've had a major explosion.
12:54We need assistance.
12:55Did you see it on fire?
12:56I repeat, we've had a mass casualty explosion.
12:58We need assistance immediately.
13:00The 2010 Deepwater Horizon drilling rig explosion served as the basis for this 2016 disaster movie.
13:06Mark Wahlberg leads the charge here with a film that may have bombed at the box office, but eventually found
13:12an audience on streaming.
13:13The big special effects provide believable drama and tension, while the direction of Peter Berg solidly enlivens the script from
13:20Matthew Michael Carnahan and Matthew Sand.
13:33Adapting some truly harrowing real-world events, this adaptation effectively captures the biggest environmental disaster in the history of the
13:41United States, and its terror.
13:51Number 34, Melancholia.
13:54Is that right?
13:55Yeah.
13:56In five minutes, it'll be smaller.
14:00Controversy always seems to follow filmmaker and provocateur Lars von Trier,
14:04yet Melancholia saw the director's frequently aggressive and confrontational style muted in favor of a more streamlined approach to the
14:11apocalypse.
14:11This isn't to say that von Trier's film doesn't explore deeper topics than merely a planet that's about to smash
14:17Earth into a billion pieces.
14:18Melancholia utilizes this framework to discuss smaller, more intimate human emotions such as depression.
14:24I'm frightened, Mom.
14:27I have trouble walking properly.
14:35You can still wobble, I see.
14:37This results in an atypical disaster movie experience, yet one that's also keen to reward patient viewers that decide to
14:44take the trip.
15:02Number 33, The Towering Inferno.
15:11It's one of the first efforts that comes to mind when even the most casual of film fans hears the
15:16words disaster movie.
15:17The Towering Inferno came from the king of these kinds of pictures, producer Erwin Allen, and featured a great script
15:23from Sterling Siliphant.
15:24John Gillerman directed an A-list cast that included two absolute heavyweights, Paul Newman and Steve McQueen.
15:31Why did they make these goddamn things so heavy?
15:34I don't see why they couldn't have designed a survival suit for us like they did for football players.
15:39Faye Dunaway, Fred Astaire, and a host of other stars also make their presence known, as The Towering Inferno takes
15:45an almost perverse delight in bumping off marquee names left and right.
15:49The effects here are great for their day, while John Williams' score already proved this composer's mettle in the film
15:55world.
15:55What could we say? The Towering Inferno is a classic.
16:12Number 32, Snowpiercer.
16:22Director Bong Joon-ho is well known for the inclusion of social commentary within his films.
16:27The Academy Award-winning Parasite is proof of that, but the filmmaker's adaptation of a French graphic novel, Snowpiercer also
16:34worked wonderfully in this regard.
16:35Set during a new ice age, themes of classism are clearly evident, as the have-nots at the rear of
16:42an eternally circling train attempt to work their way to the front of this Ouroboros of death.
16:46What happens if the engine stops?
16:49We all freeze and die.
16:51But will it stop or will it stop?
16:53No, no!
16:54Can you tell us why?
16:56The engine is eternal!
16:58Yes!
16:59The engine is forever!
17:00Chris Evans, Tilda Swinton, Octavia Spencer, and more all help bring Snowpiercer to life.
17:06But it's Joon-ho's direction and co-authorship of the screenplay that keep this train steady upon its creative tracks.
17:11I've devoted my entire life to this.
17:15The eternal engine.
17:20It is eternity itself.
17:22Number 31, Children of Men.
17:25So why me?
17:26I trust you.
17:29And what happens after?
17:30Well, you take a train back, it'll be safer.
17:32No, I mean, what happens to us?
17:36I don't know.
17:37It's normally something of a red flag if a film has too many screenwriters.
17:41A sign that there was some kind of disagreement or chaos along the way.
17:45That said, Children of Men from 2006 has managed to buck this idea.
17:49Earning a cult reputation for how it handled its premise of protecting what could be the last pregnant woman on
17:54earth.
17:55Then the baby kicked.
17:57I feel it.
17:59Little bastard was alive and I feel it and me too.
18:02I am alive.
18:03This plot line wasn't entirely original.
18:07Children of Men has been accused of ripping off Sergio Martino's 1983 film,
18:112019, after the fall of New York,
18:14while also being an adaptation of a 1992 novel from author P.D. James.
18:18Still, the execution here more than stands upon its own merit,
18:22balancing action beats with drama and heart to create memorable viewing.
18:26You put their lives at risk.
18:28Just let it go.
18:28You don't know what you're doing.
18:29No.
18:31Look around you.
18:32It's the uprising.
18:34And they haven't even seen the baby.
18:36Let's go.
18:36No!
18:37Number 30.
18:38These Final Hours.
18:39This Australian thriller takes an unusual approach to the disaster movie drama.
18:43Most of it takes place after an asteroid has already hit Earth.
18:46And the folks down under have about 12 hours until the firestorm wipes them all out.
18:50As you might expect, people have wildly different reactions to the news.
18:54At least they're all together, right?
18:57Huh.
18:59Huh.
18:59We want to live in a world where you can't even say goodbye to your grandkids.
19:03Some just want to be close to their families, while others decide to party it up.
19:07The entire movie is incredibly tense, focusing primarily on one man and his struggles as the clock ticks down to
19:13Armageddon.
19:14It forces you to ask yourself, what would you do if the world was about to end?
19:18I love you.
19:20I love you.
19:21Number 29.
19:23Twisters.
19:24This sequel to the 1996 classic ramps the danger up to 11.
19:28Tornadoes are one of nature's most unforgiving forces.
19:31Twisters gets up close and personal with them, giving viewers an intense look at what it's like to get caught
19:37up in one.
19:37Don't let it get me!
19:39Please!
19:39Keep your head now, just stay low.
19:41Eyes on me.
19:42I can do it!
19:42Stay low!
19:43No, no, no, no, no!
19:43I can do it!
19:45I can do it!
19:46Entire buildings are wiped away in the blink of an eye, and the threat of flying debris never ends.
19:51The movie also isn't afraid to kill off major characters.
19:55Imagine getting swept up by 200 mile per hour winds and then falling from 10 or 20 stories.
20:01It has to be one of the most terrifying ways to go.
20:03You've got to be okay!
20:05Keep holding on!
20:07I've got you!
20:08I've got you Kate!
20:10I've got you!
20:11Number 28.
20:13Pompeii.
20:14Kit Harington plays a gladiator during the last days of the ancient Roman city of Pompeii.
20:18In 79 AD, Mount Vesuvius erupted, burying the city in lava, rock and ash, and killing thousands.
20:26The residents of Pompeii had no idea the eruption was coming.
20:29In fact, they probably didn't even know that Vesuvius was a volcano.
20:33It's time to go, my friend.
20:34No.
20:35The harbor's gone.
20:36We have to find another way.
20:37Then we have to go south into the hills.
20:38It's too far.
20:39We never make it on foot.
20:40Then we go there.
20:41The film was a bit of a flop, but definitely not because of the eruption scenes.
20:45Those are awesome.
20:47Flaming rocks fly through the air, people get trampled as crowds panic, and a tsunami destroys everything in its path.
20:53It's not a perfectly accurate recreation of the event, but it is an exciting one.
20:58Look at me.
21:04Just me.
21:05Number 27.
21:07Armageddon.
21:07The scariest part of this early Michael Bay film is knowing that it will happen someday.
21:12Not this exact scenario, obviously, but giant asteroids have hit the Earth before, and they will again.
21:18And even a moderately sized asteroid can cause major devastation.
21:21It's what we call a global killer.
21:24The end of mankind.
21:26Doesn't matter where it hits, nothing would survive, not even bacteria.
21:30The scenes of huge space rocks wiping out New York, Shanghai, and Paris are chilling.
21:35And the thought that there's almost nothing we could do about it is even worse.
21:38Seeing an entire city reduced to rubble in seconds is enough to give anyone nightmares.
21:43Even if you're lucky enough to survive, the fallout might make you wish you hadn't.
21:47So, while the consciousness of the planet is unified, focused on the NASA mission taking place right now in the
21:53vast ocean of space,
21:54we're now in the final hours of the mission as a freedom and independence prepared to slingshot around the moon.
22:00Number 26.
22:01719.
22:04If you're claustrophobic, this movie is definitely not for you.
22:08Most disaster movies don't linger on the suffering.
22:10In the previous films on our list, it's implied that deaths are quick and not that painful.
22:15That is not the case for 719, which revolves around a real-life earthquake that killed thousands of people in
22:21Mexico City in 1985.
22:23The movie takes place almost entirely in the rubble of an office building,
22:27where two trapped men and a handful of other survivors try to keep each other from going crazy.
22:32They're terrified and in pain, and they have no idea whether help is coming.
22:36The film is almost scary enough to be classified as a horror.
22:41Number 25.
22:43Underwater.
22:43This movie actually is classified as horror.
22:47Kristen Stewart stars in this underrated 2020 sci-fi, which takes place in the near future.
22:52After an earthquake destroys a drilling operation at the bottom of the ocean, the surviving workers stationed there have to
22:57evacuate.
23:04With not enough escape pods to go around, several of them are forced to put on pressure suits and walk
23:09to the nearest intact facility a mile away.
23:11In addition to the dangers of the extreme depths, they encounter horrifying monsters in the water who want to eat
23:17them alive.
23:18It's basically 47 meters down meets alien.
23:21We gotta get into the pods!
23:24Come over!
23:25We begin evacuation to solve this immediately.
23:29Number 24.
23:30The Wandering Earth.
23:31You might have heard that someday the sun will expand until it swallows the earth.
23:35In this Chinese film, that day arrives much sooner than people expected.
23:39How can humanity possibly survive such an event?
23:42By creating thousands of massive thrusters to turn the planet into one big spaceship.
23:47This movie starts by killing off half the earth's population and it only gets freakier from there.
23:52The surface freezes over as the planet moves away from the sun, and the AI doing the navigating goes rogue
23:57and decides to abandon everyone.
23:59On their way out of the solar system, Earth accidentally gets trapped in Jupiter's gravity and risks crashing into the
24:05gas giant.
24:06The film is an intense thriller that every sci-fi fan should watch.
24:16Number 23.
24:18Greenland.
24:18Similar to these final hours, Greenland follows a small group of people as they prepare for the impact of a
24:24comet that will obliterate most life on Earth.
24:32The movie flew under the radar thanks to the pandemic, but the audiences who did see it praised its realism.
24:38As a family attempts to make its way to an underground bunker in Greenland, they're threatened by more than just
24:43a natural disaster.
24:44Desperate to survive, people swarm airplanes, attack each other, and even kidnap the family's kid in hopes it will get
24:51them into the bunker.
24:52I'm so sorry.
24:54I'm so sorry.
24:57I'll never let that happen again.
24:59The violence and mass panic make the humans in the film much scarier than the actual comet.
25:05Number 22.
25:06Skyfire.
25:06We really shouldn't have to say this, but don't build a resort right next to an active volcano.
25:12Another big-budget Chinese film with impressive special effects.
25:15Skyfire features a group of scientists and tourists on a tropical island who are caught off guard by an unexpected
25:20eruption.
25:28The spectacular scenery and wild action sequences alone are enough to make this one worth a watch.
25:34Director Simon West has a fantastic eye for danger, and the cast really sells it.
25:50If you loved Jurassic Park but would rather see a Jeep fleeing lava instead of a T-Rex, then this
25:56is the movie for you.
25:57Number 21.
25:59Sunshine.
26:00If we had a nickel for every time Cillian Murphy played a physicist named Robert who designs a bomb that
26:05will change the fate of the world,
26:06we'd only have two nickels, but it's weird that it happened twice.
26:09The sun is dying, and a group of brave scientists and astronauts plan to fly as close to it as
26:14possible and launch a bomb at its core to reignite it.
26:16You have to move now! Captain, it's right on you!
26:20The tornado's not gonna make it.
26:22You have to move! You have to move now!
26:25It's too far.
26:26The premise may sound wacky, but the movie is anything but.
26:30The crew must face dangerous accidents, equipment failures, and of course, the ever-increasing intensity of the sun.
26:36Some of them don't handle the stress well.
26:39Sunshine is another extremely intense film where other people are a bigger threat than the actual disaster.
26:44The only dream I ever have is the surface of the sun.
26:49Number 20.
26:50Everest.
26:51This film is another that stands out from the pack in that it's actually based on true events.
26:56This helps give it a grounded sense of realism while also thrilling audiences with incredible scenes of action and bravery.
27:03I'm done, pal.
27:06I'm done.
27:07The story is based on the 1996 Mount Everest disaster, which resulted in the deaths of eight climbers.
27:14This is a very well-made film, with hair-raising stunts, gorgeous cinematography, and immersive production design.
27:21It's the closest that most of us will get to Everest, and it allows us to grasp its near unearthly
27:27power from the safety of our couches.
27:29The health team are going to go up.
27:31They're going to mount a search as soon as they can.
27:34Anyone who's going, we're going to leave at dawn when they're committing.
27:37Of course, at dawn.
27:37That's great, David.
27:38Go let Ed know what's going on.
27:40I'll be right behind you.
27:41The four come in.
27:41Number 19.
27:43Aftershock.
27:44This disaster film goes a lot harder than most, and it may come at the detriment of some viewers' enjoyment.
27:49Aftershock is about a major earthquake that hits Chile, and the nasty civil unrest that follows.
27:56I promise.
27:57Chile didn't suffer.
28:00The violence is far more graphic than what you typically see in disaster flicks, depicting realistic dismemberments and acts of
28:08extreme indecency that are shown in graphic detail.
28:10With the horror coming from the characters rather than the calamity itself, Aftershock serves as a unique twist on the
28:17genre.
28:18But those wanting more cinematic fun out of their disaster films would do well to stay clear.
28:31Number 18.
28:33White Squall.
28:34Did you know that Ridley Scott directed a disaster film in the 90s?
28:37It didn't do so well at the box office.
28:40So we'd forgive you if you didn't.
28:42But it's well worth checking out.
28:43It's called White Squall, and it's about a sailing ship that sinks in the middle of the ocean.
28:48Chuck!
28:48Chuck!
28:49Chuck!
28:50We gotta go, Chuck!
28:51Come on!
28:53She's going down!
28:54Come on, Chuck!
28:55Go!
28:55While the story itself is mostly fiction, the story came from the sinking of the Albatross in 1961, which saw
29:02the deaths of six people.
29:03The survivors then rowed in small lifeboats back to Florida.
29:06White Squall horrifyingly portrays the dangers of the open ocean, and how it can so easily wash away our structures
29:13and ambitions.
29:14The sinking scene is particularly stressful, and directed with the typical assuredness of Ridley Scott.
29:22Chuck!
29:24Chuck!
29:25Chuck!
29:25Turn the floor!
29:30Number 17, Crawl.
29:32This movie combines two blood-curdling things, hurricanes and alligators.
29:37The story concerns Hayley Keller and her father Dave,
29:41both of whom become trapped in a crawl space during a ferocious hurricane.
29:50Their situation is made even worse by circling alligators who populate the nearby waters.
29:56Crawl is a wonderful homage to B-movie creature features,
29:59but it's also competently made with strong direction and good performances.
30:03It's much better than it has any right to be,
30:06and features lots of great monster-based spooks.
30:09The violence is suitably bloody,
30:11the setting is eerily claustrophobic,
30:13and there are jump scares galore.
30:25Number 16, Earthquake.
30:27The 70s were big on disaster flicks,
30:30and Earthquake is one of its standout examples.
30:32Have I failed to meet city or state safety requirements?
30:35That's not the point.
30:36I think we should go beyond the codes.
30:38You remember the Sylmar Quaker.
30:40A lot of buildings that met the code collapsed.
30:43This film was once the cornerstone of cinematic technology.
30:46It won a Special Achievement Academy Award for visual effects,
30:50and it was made with an exclusive process called Sense Around
30:53that delivered realistic and engrossing sound design.
30:56The visual and auditory experiences combine to create a classic of the genre.
31:01The destruction of Los Angeles is very cinematic and captured with horrifying detail,
31:06including many graphic deaths and moments of great danger.
31:10Even to this day, Earthquake has the power to shock and amaze.
31:14This used to be a hell of a town, I don't know if it's in.
31:22Number 15, Only the Brave.
31:25Joseph Kaczynski's movie did not perform well,
31:28grossing just $26 million on a $38 million budget.
31:32It's a shame because Only the Brave is a fantastic disaster movie
31:35that beautifully honors a real-life tragedy.
31:46It's about the Yarnell Hill Fire,
31:49an Arizona wildfire that occurred in the summer of 2013.
31:52It was fought by the Granite Mountain hotshots of the Prescott Fire Department,
31:56and 19 of the 20 firefighters perished in the blaze.
32:00The movie is richly directed by Kaczynski,
32:02offering up plenty of mesmerizing practical effects
32:05that capture the nightmarish reality of wildfires.
32:08Like Everest, it flawlessly blends realism with cinematic flourishes,
32:12depicting a true hell on Earth.
32:15Should have been me.
32:19Yeah, he was better than me.
32:21They were all better than me.
32:23Number 14, The Impossible.
32:25The 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake was a cataclysmic disaster
32:28of unimaginable proportions,
32:30and it's captured in startling fashion within The Impossible.
32:33The film expertly balances the humane with the grand
32:37by focusing on one family's experiences within the bigger disaster.
32:51It does not hold back,
32:53offering many realistic scenes of intense destruction.
32:56The prolonged tsunami sequence is absolutely brutal,
33:00complete with widespread carnage and shocking images of injury and death.
33:04The aftermath is equally upsetting,
33:07with the story packing incredible emotional power.
33:10It examines touching themes of family, love, and endurance,
33:14but it's told through the lens of a modern catastrophe.
33:18Mom, Mom, wake up.
33:23That's what I just saw outside.
33:25My leg.
33:26The color is my leg.
33:28Number 13, Volcano.
33:30You can probably guess what this classic of the genre is about.
33:341943, a Mexican farmer sees smoke coming out of the middle of his cornfield.
33:37A week later, there's a volcano a thousand feet high.
33:40There's no history of anything until it happens.
33:42Then there is.
33:43Starring Tommy Lee Jones,
33:45Volcano tells of an eruption at the La Brea Tar Pits
33:47and the resulting damage that it causes to Los Angeles.
33:50This movie trades traditional disaster scares for a tense and slow-paced atmosphere,
33:55as a huge lava flow slowly approaches the downtown core of the city.
34:00Of course, there are also many scenes of calamity and death,
34:03with one, shall we say, melting being particularly disturbing.
34:08Volcanoes are traditional disaster fare,
34:10but by bringing the action to modern L.A.,
34:13Volcano brings their apocalyptic dangers closer to home.
34:16We know it broke through here,
34:18and the tar pits created this vent.
34:19We now know that it broke through a part of the park.
34:21That means that it's traveling laterally underground
34:25over the course of at least eight miles.
34:27Number 12, The Perfect Storm.
34:29Those who hate the open ocean would do well to avoid The Perfect Storm.
34:33It is, you could say, a perfect storm of what makes disaster movies work.
34:37Like The Impossible, it narrows a larger event to focus on the specific experiences of a single group.
34:57It's based on Sebastian Junger's book of the same name,
35:00which details The Perfect Storm of 1991 and the loss of a fishing vessel called the Andrea Gale.
35:05The special effects remain eye-popping,
35:08and the hugely talented ensemble sells the horror of their situation with gusto.
35:13With startling scenes of ocean-based horror and a bleak ending,
35:17The Perfect Storm is an unforgettable viewing experience.
35:29Number 11, Knowing.
35:31While Alex Proyas' disaster flick does involve extraterrestrial beings,
35:36at the center of the plot is an apocalyptic natural disaster,
35:39a solar flare that will destroy all life on Earth.
35:43A 100 micro-Tesla wave of radiation that would destroy our ozone layer,
35:48killing every living organism on the planet.
35:50The lead-up to this calamitous event is full of portentous biblical imagery,
35:54from the whispering spirits to the spaceships that represent Noah's Ark.
35:58The movie sets a dour tone and doesn't really let up throughout its two-hour runtime,
36:03offering up a modern-day parable about humanity's vulnerability.
36:06It's a chilling exploration of just how fragile life is on a cosmic scale.
36:11I'm not saying that 81 people are going to die tomorrow, okay?
36:15I'm just trying to understand why this is saying they will!
36:18Okay, it's spooky, alright? I'll grant you, it's more than spooky.
36:21Number 10, The Core.
36:22Doctors Zimski and Keyes.
36:27You guys are our resident geophysicists. What do you make of this?
36:31Sure, it was silly.
36:32Alright, downright absurd.
36:33The premise, that the Earth's core had suddenly stopped rotating,
36:36made no more sense than our heroes planned to nuke it back to life.
36:40Zimski.
36:40Yeah?
36:42We're inside a giant jump bubble,
36:45wrapped in a cobalt cocoon,
36:48700 miles below the surface of the Earth.
36:53Hell of a day.
36:54But in a way, the improbability of their mission just made it all the more desperate.
36:59Most frightening, however, was the isolating and claustrophobic nature of their task.
37:03As they drilled down deep into the Earth,
37:06far from friends, family, and, well, human beings in general.
37:10Thank goodness for unobtainium, the material used to build their vessel.
37:14Despite the silliness, there are some knuckle-biting scenes when it all goes wrong
37:18that left audiences sweating as much as the crew.
37:2129,000 feet.
37:22Do it!
37:25Do it!
37:27No!
37:37Number 9. Dante's Peak.
37:40Did anybody feel that?
37:41Amid all the movies about volcanic eruptions,
37:43Dante's Peak has a reputation for being relatively accurate.
37:46Emphasis on relatively.
37:47Experts praised the special effects and the portrayal of the geological survey team,
37:52but were less impressed with how different volcanic processes are all mixed in together.
37:56In striking this balance, though,
37:58the movie manages to build tension in a convincing way
38:00before delivering a horrifying eruption scene
38:03that puts other volcano movies to shame.
38:10Sure, a lake probably couldn't transform into an acid bath quite so quickly,
38:15but if you want to see what the apocalypse would look like,
38:17Dante's Peak has it all.
38:22Number 8. San Andreas.
38:24How bad did they get hit?
38:31That's six.
38:34Was it big, loud, and preposterous?
38:36Absolutely.
38:37But the visual effects were on point.
38:39And the premise of a devastating earthquake in California, all too real.
38:44Brad Payton's 2015 disaster film, San Andreas,
38:48pit Mother Nature against Los Angeles and the San Francisco Bay Area.
38:51And although The Rock did his best to save the day,
38:53it's pretty clear who won.
38:55While the science might have been fudged,
38:57the incredible CGI made the movie frightening nonetheless.
39:00The moment the Earth ripples like a rug being shaken is chilling enough,
39:05but the subsequent scenes of chaos and destruction are positively terrifying.
39:25It's the disaster movie with it all.
39:27Roland Emmerich's epic disaster bonanza played on popular paranoia leading up to the year 2012,
39:33when, according to some, the world was supposed to end.
39:35It's the apocalypse.
39:38End of days.
39:39The judgment day.
39:41The end of the world, my friend.
39:43After all, the year marked the end of a long cycle in the Mayan calendar,
39:47and therefore, the sky is falling.
39:49While that didn't happen,
39:50the movie 2012 certainly did its damnedest to frighten the bejesus out of us.
39:55The eruption of Yellowstone in particular was terrifying,
39:58especially since it actually could blow sometime in the future,
40:01even if not for the mumbo-jumbo reasons described.
40:05Hang on, baby, hang on!
40:14Number 6, Deep Impact.
40:16This comet is larger than Mount Everest.
40:19It weighs 500 billion tons.
40:23You're either a Deep Impact or an Armageddon kind of person.
40:26For this list, we're going with Deep Impact as the scarier movie,
40:30even though Armageddon was a lot more fun.
40:32Get off the nuclear warhead.
40:36With a comet heading for Earth,
40:38Robert Duvall's character, Captain Spurgeon Fish Tanner,
40:41leads a last-ditch mission to save the planet.
40:44Back on the ground,
40:45there's an incredible sense of helplessness as people prepare for the worst.
40:48The lottery system to decide who survives is much too plausible.
40:52And that tsunami scene with Taylione and Maximilian Schell waiting on the beach
40:56still haunts our nightmares.
40:58Daddy.
41:11The Poseidon Adventure was one of the most ambitious movies of the 1970s,
41:15and along with the towering inferno and airport,
41:18helped give rise to the disaster genre.
41:20It follows the sinking of a fictional luxury liner.
41:23And for a movie released in 1972,
41:26it still looks horrifyingly spectacular thanks to its Academy Award winning visual effects.
41:37In fact, it wasn't until Titanic 25 years later,
41:40that a sinking ship was so viscerally captured on film.
41:43If you've only seen the 2006 remake,
41:45do yourself a favor and watch the original.
41:48And while you're at it,
41:49purge the remake from your memory.
41:50You want another life?
41:54Then take me!
41:56Number 4.
41:57The Day After Tomorrow
41:58Oh, oh my god.
42:01Lisa, are you getting this on camera?
42:03That this tornado just came and erased the Hollywood sign.
42:06The Hollywood sign is gone.
42:08The Day After Tomorrow is classic Roland Emmerich.
42:11Loud and utterly baffling,
42:13yet absolutely thrilling thanks to its spectacular visual effects.
42:16Sometimes you just want to see the world get destroyed.
42:18And when it comes to that,
42:20The Day After Tomorrow has no rival.
42:29This movie has it all,
42:30from devastating tornadoes and hailstorms
42:32to a massive tsunami that sweeps its way through the streets of Manhattan.
42:36The image of the Statue of Liberty being swallowed by a storm surge is iconic stuff.
42:41The movie is basically a greatest hits collection of all the best disaster scenarios.
42:45And they're all shown in breathtaking and terrifying fashion.
42:55Number 3.
42:56The Birds
43:04Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds is a horror thriller
43:06with all the hallmarks of a great disaster movie too.
43:09You've got your ominous warning signs in the form of the first attacks and birds flying into windows.
43:14And then come escalating scenes of ever greater chaos and destruction,
43:18including a corpse with its eyes gouged out,
43:21a hysterical prophet of doom,
43:22and an explosion at a gas station.
43:25Watch out!
43:26Look out!
43:27Look out!
43:27Watch out!
43:30Then of course,
43:31there's that famous downer ending
43:33that signals the possible end of the world as we know it.
43:36It's certainly a classic horror movie,
43:38but in some ways,
43:39it's also a precursor to the entire disaster genre.
43:42Don't they ever stop migrating?
43:48Number 2.
43:49The Wave
43:55This small-budget Norwegian movie blew away critics
43:59with special effects to rival Hollywood blockbusters.
44:02Inspired by real natural disasters in Norway's northwestern fjords,
44:06The Wave follows a geologist and his family
44:08as they try to escape a 260-foot-tall tsunami.
44:12It's a simple story,
44:13and it borrows many disaster cliches,
44:15but its slow pace allows audiences to broil in the tension
44:19and grow attached to the characters,
44:21which makes the inevitable destruction all the more compelling.
44:24Every disaster buff needs to check out The Wave.
44:27Just don't watch the horrible English dub.
44:29It's completely hopeless.
44:31Yeah?
44:31Would you rather be out there?
44:32Huh?
44:32Okay, calm down.
44:33You know what you should watch, though?
44:35The 2018 sequel, The Quake.
44:45Number 1.
44:46Moonfall
44:47We don't know about you,
44:49but nothing scares us more than the moon
44:51detaching from its interstellar orbit
44:53and rapidly hurtling towards Earth.
44:55Something obviously happened to the one inside our moon,
44:57and that's why it's veering off course.
45:01No, just kidding.
45:02That's ridiculous, even by disaster movie standards.
45:05Number 1.
45:06Twister
45:14There might be bigger, louder, more apocalyptic disaster movies,
45:18but there is no disaster movie quite like Twister.
45:21Twister captured a nation in 1996
45:23thanks to its relentless action and impressive set pieces,
45:27some of which have become iconic staples of the genre.
45:30One only need hear the word Twister to conjure up images of a drive-in being destroyed,
45:34a cow being hurled through the air,
45:36or a farm being decimated by a massive cloud of swirling black dust.
45:47It was enough to give kids nightmares,
45:49and to make adults fear the wrath of tornadoes.
45:52Who knew scientific research was so action-packed?
46:05What to you makes a great disaster film?
46:08Let us know in the comments.
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