Disaster movies have been a Hollywood staple since time immemorial. Thanks to the advent of CGI, the recreation of natural disasters has been really true to life in such films. But Hollywood filmmakers aren’t just content with showcasing the fury of nature. They make sure to put in elements from comedy, from action flicks, even from heist dramas into disaster movies. While we’re battling with this disaster called COVID-19 by sitting at home, we bring you a list of some recent Hollywood films belonging to the disaster movie genre that offers a mix of everything.

This Is the End (2013)

This apocalyptic comedy, starring James Franco, Jonah Hill, Rogen, Jay Baruchel, Danny McBride, and Craig Robinson, revolves around fictionalized versions of its cast caught in a global apocalypse of biblical proportions. The film is written, directed and co-produced by Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg in their directorial debuts. It is a feature-length film adaptation of the short film Jay and Seth versus the Apocalypse (2007) also written by Rogen and Goldberg. Basically it’s a spoof of every kind of disaster movie there is. It has an earthquake, cannibals, zombies, and also demons. There’s a scene where two characters argue with Satan. Basically the premise is that James Franco hosts a housewarming party, which is attended by like every known comic actor in Hollywood. A natural disaster strikes and those who have survived settle inside the house and wait for rescue. But then all kinds of monsters enter the scene. There are disagreements between the group, leading to fights. Also, there’s a mysterious blue beam which might be beaming up people to Heaven. The various actors played exaggerated versions of themselves. The film was praised for its spoofy take on the disaster movie genre.

Pompeii (2014)

This historical disaster film is produced and directed by Paul W. S. Anderson and stars Kit Harington, Emily Browning, Carrie-Anne Moss, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Jessica Lucas, Jared Harris, and Kiefer Sutherland. Kit Harington underwent a gruelling training regimen for the film in order to bulk up for the role. In 79 AD a gladiator slave (Kit Harington) and a nobleman's daughter (Emily Browning) fall, love, only to have their romance face all kinds of hindrances -- like the difference in their social status, the crafty mechanisms of an evil Roman senator (Kiefer Sutherland) and to top it all, an exploding volcano in the end. Don’t watch the film for its cheesy storyline but for its imaginatively choreographed action scenes and its detailed CGI work depicting the Pompeii disaster.

San Andreas (2015)

Directed by Brad Peyton and starring Dwayne Johnson, Carla Gugino, Alexandra Daddario, Ioan Gruffudd, Kylie Minogue and Paul Giamatti, the plot of this disaster movie revolves around an earthquake caused by the San Andreas Fault devastating Los Angeles and the San Francisco Bay Area. When a 9.1 magnitude earthquake devastates Los Angeles and San Francisco, The Rock, who plays a helicopter rescue pilot in the film, finds himself rescuing his estranged wife. The duo then teams up to rescue their daughter, who has found shelter, thanks to two good Samaritans. They survive a helicopter crash, have to jump out of a plane wearing parachutes, race a Tsunami and face another earthquake before finally reaching their daughter and saving her from drowning. Whoever wrote the script surely went a bit overboard! One can’t deny that Dwayne Johnson makes even stupid movies look good. The film was hugely praised for its awesome CGI.

Deepwater Horizon (2016)

Deepwater Horizon is a 2016 American disaster film based on the Deepwater Horizon explosion and oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, termed as the worst oil disaster in US history. It’s adapted from The New York Times article Deepwater Horizon's Final Hours, written by David Barstow, David Rohde, and Stephanie Sau. Directed by Peter Berg, the film stars Mark Wahlberg, Kurt Russell, John Malkovich, Gina Rodriguez, Dylan O'Brien, and Kate Hudson. Mike Williams (Mark Wahlberg) and his wife Felicia (Kate Hudson), are shown to be a lovey-dovey couple before the action shifts to the Gulf of Mexico where he works as a Chief Electronics Technician abroad an oil rig. We also meet Offshore Installation Manager James Harrell (Kurt Russell). The first half of the film is filled with oil exploration jargon. The film slowly builds up the tension and when the oil spill happens and everything seems to be on fire, we’re in for a vision of hell alright. It looks like a lost cause from the word go and it’s a surprise that so many people actually survived. Both Wahlberg and Russell are shown doing a fair bit of heroics but beyond the cinematic liberties, what the film actually fills you in is a detailed account of what an ecological disaster actually looks like.

The Hurricane Heist (2018)

Directed by Rob Cohen, the film stars Toby Kebbell, Maggie Grace, Ryan Kwanten, Melissa Bolona, and Ralph Ineson, and is about a band of thieves who plan to use a Category 5 hurricane to cover their tracks of a bank robbery. Rob Cohen was the director of the original xXx and the first The Fast and the Furious and he combines his love of high octane adventure with the basic premise of The Perfect Storm to and throws in the plot of a heist movie in this film which like the hurricane it describes becomes a force of nature in itself and rambles along wherever the fancy takes it. It’s chock-a-block with so many improbabilities that after a point you kind of stop counting. The end sequence is straight out of the Fast and the Furious franchise, with a trio of trucks chasing each other with the storm on their backs. Watch the film for its impressive storm effects, which are the best thing about it really. More on: Best Hollywood disaster movies from the recent times, This Is the End, Pompeii, San Andreas, Deepwater Horizon, The Hurricane Heist

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