Scorched (2009)

I was totally surprised at how great this film.You could feel your paranoia rise as the film went on and as you gradually learned the details of the real situation.

Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.

There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

I have just read the reviews of this show by a number of alleged viewers & I am at a loss as to what they think they actually viewed. It was convenient, in hindsight, that the date of the supposed action was "5 years in the future". This makes the date irrelevant with regard to it referring to any particular year, 2012, 2013, 2025 or any other year as obviously if I watch it now (2011) it becomes 2016. In any case the film should have been released in 2007 to be "5 years" in the future of 2012. Some reviewers were unable to figure out how long the drought was. One, was unable to use the automatic spell checker & obviously did not read his review - how long has anyone lived in "Sidney, New Soth Wales". The same person also doesn't understand that the abbreviation PM means Prime Minister when the reference should have been State Premier (or just Premier), and since when have we "brung" anything.Unfortunately, some reviewers also may have spoken in 'tongues'. I have lived in Australia for more than 60 years & I still don't know what the AIIMS... is, incidentally the ABC might mean American Broadcasting Corporation (or Company, or .....). Please, space out acronyms as full words at least once in your review as not everyone knows what they mean.Thanks to those members of the Australian Rural Fire Service for their input on how it actually related to the Service Aussies are very proud of these people who volunteer their time (mostly FREE) to help others. It should be appreciated that real fire-fighters thought enough of the film to even make comments, it also shows how seriously Aussies take the danger of bush-fires & willingness of everyone to chip in. Of course the actual supposition that there is 'absolutely no water anywhere' to use to fight bush-fires does stretch the imagination, just a l i t t l e {LOL}. There are so many creeks & dams around Sydney, New South Wales, Australia (and all Australia) that the drought would have to have been a lot, lot (many lots) longer than 200 or so days of the film. Even when the film was made some localities in Australia were in areas declared drought for a lot longer than that.Well, after all that my review of the film is that while it is definitely not in same league as 'Armageddon', 'The Day After' or other similar disaster movies, it was a film worth watching, especially for those who like the nitty-gritty of the interaction between persons who could be 'you' (or/and maybe 'me').(NOTE: LOL = laughing out loud)

I don't normally comment on movies but in this case I had to after reading a lot of negative comments about this one. First off I've seen people saying it's full of plot holes, if you think that you simply didn't understand what the movie was all about. It's about the emotional effects that these kind of fires have on the crews fighting them, it's not about how much you care about the people in the movie, it's about how much they care about each other and how they have to put their own feelings aside to get the job done.I am a firefighter and I must say there was 2 things about this movie that just would not happen. First the trucks running out of water that close to the fire, the safety system in place would not allow that to happen. Second thing was the burn over of the 4WD, no firefighter would ever try to out run a fire like they did, the result of trying to out run a wildfire is always death. No Australian firefighter would allow themselves to be in a wildfire situation and not have at least a 1/4 tank of water for safety. Modern fire trucks designed for wildfires (tankers) are equipped low water alert systems. They also have crew safety system that engulf the entire truck in water in case of a burn over, as well as fire blankets for every member on the truck and fire curtains in the cabin of the truck, this just wouldn't happen the way it did in the movie anymore and if it did someone made one hell of a mistake. The last few months have proved that the safety protocols that have been put in place over the last 10 years work.

I'm not quite sure if I watched the same Australian film as the majority of the other reviewers (or if they in fact are employees of channel nine!) This was a really disappointing film...The casting was spot on... the acting was great... the script was useless.It was badly paced... some story lines were wrapped up too quickly, others not even explained...I feel like there was never any connection felt between any of the characters or story lines... if I felt anything it was because of the wonderful acting on the show.

apologies to all actors concerned , as they all did a decent job throughout, unfortunately the plot was weak, and the story appeared to be cut to ribbons. upon the death of one particular character we, the audience, are supposed to feel sad, but as we had only met this character once, and don't really care its a completely hollow moment. there is no real feeling of danger at any point in the film, and the whole affair feels like a watered down disaster movie. when we live in an age of films like, the day after tomorrow, the core, volcano and dantes peak (admitedly not great films, but still the spectacle in these films is huge) this below average telemovie just doesn't cut it. im all for Australia trying to branch out from the usual Aussie battler stories but this was a limp effort.maybe the 2 hours added to the DVD will help the viewer care more about all the characters, but i wont be watching it to find out, good luck to those of you who do.