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Dante’s Peak movie storyline. Old Smokey develops a bad temper in this volcanic disaster spectacle. Harry Dalton (Pierce Brosnan) is a volcano expert whose interest became more than academic after he lost the woman he loved in a volcanic emergency. When he is sent to investigate unusual seismic activity in the quiet Pacific Northwest community of Dante’s Peak, he discovers people boiled to death in the local hot spring and plant and animal life dying or displaying unusual illnesses near the city’s supposedly dormant volcano.
Harry becomes convinced that a major volcanic catastrophe is in the cards. Rachel Wando (Linda Hamilton), the town’s mayor, is a single mother who also runs the local cafe, and now that Dante’s Peak has been named one of the most desirable small towns in America, tourists have been flocking to the diner and other local businesses.
Dante’s Peak is a 1997 American dramatic disaster thriller film directed by Roger Donaldson. Starring Pierce Brosnan, Linda Hamilton, Charles Hallahan, Elizabeth Hoffman, Jamie Renée Smith, Jeremy Foley and Grant Heslov, the film was set in the fictional town of Dante’s Peak where the inhabitants must survive the volcano’s eruption and its dangers. It was released on February 7, 1997 under the production of Sony, Universal Pictures and Pacific Western.
About the Production
Principal Photography began on May 6, 1996. 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, California 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, Mount St. Helens eruption and perished during the event.
A brief scene was actually shot inside the crater of Washington State’s Mount St. Helens. It is the scene where a scientist gets caught in a rock slide and breaks his leg while climbing down inside the crater to repair a malfunctioning piece of scientific equipment. The giveaway of this shot is a brief appearance by Mount Adams, a dormant 12,776-foot (3,894 m)-high peak 35 miles (56 km) east of Mount St. Helens, above the crater rim as the view focuses on the scientists. The scene was actually filmed on the tarmac of Van Nuys Airport while the Mount Adams image was green screened. Production was completed on August 31, 1996.
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.[3] The computer-generated imagery was mostly coordinated and supervised by Patrick McClung, Roy Arbogast, Lori J. Nelson, Richard Stutsman and Dean Miller.
Although the film uses considerable amounts of CGI, the volcanic ash in the film was created using cellulose insulation manufactured by Regal Industries in Crothersville, Indiana. Between visuals, miniatures, and animation, over 300 technicians were directly involved in the production aspects of the special effects. Despite the complexity of its visual effects, Dante’s Peak was not nominated for an Academy Award for Best Visual Effects that year, as it faced stiff competition from Titanic, The Lost World: Jurassic Park and Starship Troopers.
Dante’s Peak (1997)
Directed by: Roger Donaldson
Starring: Pierce Brosnan, Linda Hamilton, Jamie Renée Smith, Jeremy Foley, Elizabeth Hoffman, Charles Hallahan, Grant Heslov, Arabella Field, Carole Androsky, Lee Garlington
Screenplay by: Leslie Bohem
Production Design by: J. Dennis Washington
Cinematography by: Andrzej Bartkowiak
Film Editing by: Conrad Buff, Tina Hirsch, Howard E. Smith
Costume Design by: Isis Mussenden
Set Decoration by: Marvin March
Art Direction by: Francis J. Pezza, Thomas T. Taylor
Music by: James Newton Howard, John Frizzell
MPAA Rating: PG-13 for disaster related peril and gore.
Distributed by: Universal Pictures
Release Date: February 7, 1997
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