Dante's Peak

Dante's Peak Information

Dante's Peak is a 1997 action/adventure thriller directed by Roger Donaldson and starring Pierce Brosnan, Linda Hamilton, Charles Hallahan, Elizabeth Hoffman, Jamie Renée Smith, Jeremy Foley, and Grant Heslov. Set in the fictional town of Dante's Peak, the town must survive the volcano and its dangers. A Universal Pictures and Pacific Western production, it was released on February 7, 1997, and rated PG-13.

Plot

Dr. Harry Dalton, a volcanologist with the United States Geological Survey, and his associate/partner Marianne attempt to escape an erupting volcano in Colombia. While trying to escape the ash and falling debris, Marianne is killed when a piece of debris smashes through the roof of Harry's truck.

Four years later, Harry is sent by his boss Dr. Paul Dreyfus to check out volcanic activity in the small town of Dante's Peak, Washington, situated beside a dormant stratovolcano within the Northern Cascades. Harry arrives in town and meets Mayor Rachel Wando who has two children, Graham and Lauren. Before Rachel can show him the lake, they go to drop off the children to Rachel's late husband's mother Ruth who lives on the mountain. Ruth suggests that they all go swim in the Twonset Hot Springs. Harry notices that the lake's acidity is somewhat high, trees are dying and they discover dead squirrels. Graham is about to jump into the springs when Harry stops him, noticing two bodies having been boiled by the water. Harry knows this is highly abnormal and, worried about the volcanic activity in the mountain, requests Rachel to call a town meeting and inform Paul of the situation.

While Harry is advising putting the town on alert, Paul shows up and stops him by telling him that he is overreacting and that for now they will just observe, giving the example of another town in Washington state that they thought would be destroyed by an eruption. After Paul called the town on alert and evacuated it, nothing happened. The scare caused a severe lack of tourism in the town and it nearly went bankrupt as a result. This convinces the city council to avoid calling an alert, although Harry insists that Paul is making a big mistake; however Harry's warnings fall on deaf ears. While Paul and his team are setting up and monitoring the volcano, Harry and Rachel become close. After a week and no major volcanic activity, Paul decides they can monitor the volcano back home and tells everyone to pack up.

Harry goes to say goodbye to Rachel, they almost kiss but Lauren wakes up stating that she needs a glass of water. Rachel points out that there is something wrong with the strong-smelling tap water and Harry discovers by visiting the main water supply that the volcanic activity has leached sulphur dioxide into the water. Harry shows this to Paul and they all then realise it is only a matter of time before the volcano erupts.

While informing the town's residents of the evacuation plans, a massive earthquake strikes Dante's Peak as the volcano erupts violently, both of which cause mass and widespread panic. While trying to get to Rachel's children, they drive through the town as it is being destroyed by earthquakes, with panicked evacuees trying to leave.

Arriving at Rachel's house, they find the children missing. When they reach the dining table, Rachel picks up a note left by the children that says that they went up the mountain to get Ruth, who refused to leave her home. After Rachel and Harry reaches Ruth's house and find the children, a lava flow burns Ruth's house, forcing them to the lake. The lake, which has been turned to acid, starts eating away at the boat and propeller. They are almost at the other side when the propeller gets eaten away. Harry wraps his arm in his jacket to paddle but they are sinking too fast. Trying to save everyone, Ruth jumps in the shallow part of the lake and pulls the boat to the dock, seriously burning her legs. Ruth dies due to the shock and trauma yet makes peace with Rachel.

With everybody out of town, Paul and the team evacuate with the National Guard but the river has been inundated by a lahar, a combination of the volcano's melting ice and the local dam breaking. The team gets through safely in Humvees, but Paul, driving their Dodge Ram Van, gets stuck on the bridge which is washed away by the powerful lahar. After finding a truck at a ranger station, Harry, Rachel, and the children make it back into town as the volcano violently explodes and spews ash high into the atmosphere. The weight of the ash is so great, that part of the ash cloud collapses and forms a pyroclastic flow which races down the mountain, destroying trees, houses, and the town of Dante's Peak itself. Harry drives the truck into an abandoned mine (which had been Graham's clubhouse) just in time to escape the pyroclastic cloud.

Harry has a beacon in the truck designed by NASA that will help his team locate and rescue them. He tells Rachel and the kids he will be back; he reassures everyone that when they get out he will take them deep sea fishing. As he returns the truck to activate the beacon, the mine collapses, separating him from Rachel and the children. Despite a broken arm, Harry activates the beacon while the truck is crushed by the weight of the debris.

Eventually, they are all rescued and reunited with Harry, reiterating his promise to take them deep sea fishing. As the helicopter carrying Harry and the Wando family flies off, the camera moves over the destroyed town and swerves to the Mount St. Helens-like crater where the top of the volcano used to be.

Cast

Pierce Brosnan as Dr. Harry Dalton
Linda Hamilton as Mayor Rachel Wando
Charles Hallahan as Dr. Paul Dreyfus
Elizabeth Hoffman as Grandma Ruth
Jamie Renée Smith as Lauren Wando
Jeremy Foley as Graham Wando
Grant Heslov as Greg
Kirk Trutner as Terry
Arabella Field as Nancy
Tzi Ma as Stan
Brian Reddy as Les Worrell
Bill Bolender as Sheriff Turner
Peter Jason as Norman Gates
Jeffrey L. Ward as Jack Collins
Susie Spear as Karen Narlington

Production

The film was shot on location in Wallace, Idaho, with a large hill just southeast of the town digitally altered to look like a volcano. Many scenes involving townspeople, including the initial award ceremony, the pioneer days festival, and the gymnasium scene were shot using the actual citizens of Wallace as extras. Many of the disaster evacuation scenes that did not involve stunts and other dangerous moments also featured citizens of Wallace; dangerous stunts were filmed using Hollywood extras. Mount St. Helens also makes an appearance at the very end of the movie; during the start of the closing credit crawl, the scene shows an image of a destroyed Dante's Peak community with the camera shot moving out to show a wider scene of disaster, and then showing what remains of the volcano itself. The volcano that remains is actually an image of Mount St. Helens taken from news footage just after the May 18, 1980, eruption.

Exteriors shots of the Point Dume Post Office, 29160 Heathercliff Rd, Malibu, CA were used as The USGS's David A. Johnston Cascades Volcano Observatory headquarters in Vancouver, Washington. The facility was named in honor of David A. Johnston, a young scientist who had precisely predicted the volatility of the May 18, 1980, eruption of Mount St. Helens, and perished during the event.

A brief scene in the movie was actually shot inside the crater of Washington State's Mount St. Helens. Specifically, it is the scene where one of the scientists gets caught in a rockslide and breaks his leg while trying to climb down to repair a malfunctioning piece of scientific equipment inside the crater of the volcano. The giveaway of this shot is a brief appearance by Mount Adams, a dormant -high peak east of Mount St. Helens, just above the crater rim as the view tightens in on the scientists.

Extensive special effects surrounding certain aspects of the film such as the lava and pyroclastic flows, were created by Digital Domain, Banned from the Ranch Entertainment and CIS Hollywood. The computer-generated imagery was mostly coordinated and supervised by Patrick McClung, Roy Arbogast, Lori J. Nelson, Richard Stutsman and Dean Miller. Despite a heavy use of CGI, the volcanic ash in the film was actually really finely shredded newspapers. Between visuals, miniatures, and animation, over 300 technicians were directly involved in the production aspects of the special effects. Due to the complexity of its visual effects, Dante's Peak was almost nominated for an Academy Award for Best Visual Effects. However, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences chose Titanic, The Lost World: Jurassic Park and Starship Troopers instead.

Locations

Agua Dulce, California, USA
Baker Hot Springs, Mount Baker National Forest, Washington, USA
Mount St. Helens National Volcanic Monument, Washington, USA (establishing shots)
Wallace, Idaho, USA (town exteriors)

Music

The original score was co-composed by John Frizzell and James Newton Howard. Howard wrote the main theme (heard during the opening titles) and a number of cues, while Frizzell wrote the bulk of the score.

30 minutes of the score was released by Varese Sarabande; the short album length being due to high orchestra fees at the time of release. An expanded bootleg exists which contains almost the entire score.

The contents of the CD release can also be found on the region 1 DVD, on an alternate audio track during the 'Creating a Volcano' documentary.

The "Main Titles" cue is also featured on Varese's "The Towering Inferno and Other Disaster Classics" compilation album.

Reception

The film debuted at #2 behind the special edition re-release of Star Wars with $18 million in its opening weekend. It went on to earn $178 million worldwide.

Despite having wider financial success and being slightly more scientifically accurate than Volcano, Dante's Peak opened to more unfavorable reviews than its rival, and holds a 27 percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes.