[Review] The Trigger Effect (Movie)

[StMarc]

The Trigger Effect (1996)
Starring: Kyle MacLachlan, Elisabeth Shue, See more
Director: David Koepp
Encoding: Region 1
Format: Color, Closed-captioned, Widescreen
Rated: R Not for sale to persons under age 18.
Studio: Universal Studios
ASIN: B00000IQW8
(also available on VHS)

Summary: It's a typical day in LA - that is, everybody snipes at each other constantly when they're not feeling picked upon themselves. But then the power goes out. And stays out. And it starts to get really hot in Yuppietown.

Review: For preparedness enthusiasts, "The Trigger Effect" is not a thriller: it's a comedy. My wife and I really enjoyed it, not so much because you get to see a *lot* of Elizabeth Shue, although that's worth the price of admission right there, but because every thirty seconds or so we'd turn to each other and simultaneously say, "I can't *BELIEVE* they just did that!"

Our heroes, such as they are, are the gorgeous Elizabeth, her equally-gorgeous husband Kyle MacLachlan, and his almost-as-gorgeous brother (yes, they are brothers, although this isn't very clear for most of the movie.) Elizabeth and Kyle also have a small child, the only sympathetic character in the whole movie.

The entire film is one long sequence of what would happen if the power went out, and stayed out, in a large city. TB2K readers will recognize the probable cause of the disaster as an electromagnetic pulse: not only does the power go out and the phones stop working, but there are no radio communications and many cars won't work. The movie was made while y2K fever was starting to heat up, but neither a pulse or a y2K failure are things the characters are interested in - they are totally buffaloed. The fact that the characters have no idea what could cause this sort of thing gives them additional stress, like they needed any more. Their credit cards won't work, they can't phone in prescriptions, they have no real connection with their neighbors, and they have almost no food or cash with which to buy any. It's ugly. Real ugly.

I recommend this movie to doomers with a black sense of humor, or to those who don't interact with "regular" people much, as it provides a much-needed reminder of what things would be like in the event of a major disaster. *You* may be ready and able to meet it with a minimum of fuss, but your neighbors won't be. Kyle and Elizabeth would skin you alive for a baby aspirin, you better believe it.

The performances, in my opinon, are actually fairly convincing, and the plotline, which most people would find ridiculous - massive power outages don't *really* happen, and if they did, the government would swoop in to save everybody - is reasonably solid. It's worth a few bucks as a rental - you could even use it as "doomer propaganda" for your skeptical friends and relations. If you subscribe to Netflix, it is available for rental there.

St. Marc

[StMarc]

The reviews at Amazon are hilarious to read, because the people who give it bad reviews, it's painfully obvious, don't like it because they don't want to think that things like this could happen. Since things like this don't happen, that means the movie is stupid. There are constant refrains of "nothing happens" from critics. LOTS of stuff happens. It's just that what they *want* to happen - a hero saving the day, or a "it was just a dream" sort of ending, doesn't happen.

St. Marc

[A.T.Hagan]

Now, I felt sorry for the black guy in the film as well, but he and the baby were IT so far as anyone I gave a darn about.

This film was a howler and no mistake about it. There were some scenes that made it worth watching though, such as the riots, the scene at the gun store, and the pharmacy. Especially the pharmacy since it was an excellent illustration of what desperate people will do.

They never did explain what caused the outage, but I don't think it was an EMP since there were too many cars that still ran. That was about the time of the great western states power outage as I recall where parts of something like five states were blacked out.

I'd spend a dollar to rent this film, but I certainly wouldn't spend much more than that.

.....Alan.