Aftershock: Earthquake in New York
Encyclopedia
Aftershock: Earthquake in New York is a 1999 four-hour disaster
miniseries
that was broadcast in the United States on CBS
in two parts, with the first part aired on November 14 and the second on November 16. It was released to VHS in 2000, and on DVD in 2001. It is based on a book written by Chuck Scarborough
. Starring Charles S. Dutton
, Sharon Lawrence
, Tom Skerritt
, Lisa Nicole Carson
, Jennifer Garner
, Rachel Ticotin
and Frederick Weller. under the direction of Mikael Salomon
, the miniseries follows five groups of people in the aftermath of a large earthquake
hitting New York City
.
It was nominated for an Emmy Award
for its special effects. While critics praised the special effects and cast, they heavily panned the film for its implausible scenario, predictability, and lack of realism.
) and her 9-year-old son, Danny (Michal Suchánek
), eat breakfast, Sam Thorell (Garwin Sanford
) calls from his business trip. Ballerina Diane Agostini (Jennifer Garner
) is on the phone with her father when a blender shakes off the counter. Dismissing it, she ends the call and rushes off to a rehearsal session at the New York City Ballet
. Public defender Evie Lincoln (Lisa Nicole Carson
) talks with her client Joshua Bingham (JR Bourne) about his case. That evening, tremors cause a gas leak at Diane's apartment complex. Though the electricity is still on in the evacuated building, Fire Chief Thomas Ahearn (Tom Skerritt
) sends his crew inside. The building explodes, killing several men. At a party at Gracie Mansion
, Evie's grandmother Emily Lincoln (Cicely Tyson
) chastises her for being late. Her father, Mayor Bruce Lincoln (Charles S. Dutton
), coerces her into going to a job interview
at a big law firm.
The next day, Ahearn drops his daughter, Christine, off at high school. She expresses annoyance at his quitting to get "revenge" against the "stupid" mayor over budgeting issues. At the courthouse, Joshua is found not guilty of murdering his invalid wife. Diane meets her father for lunch to get money. When she leaves, she catches a cab driven by recent Russian immigrant Nikolai Karvoski (Fred Weller
). An earthquake hits the city, toppling many buildings and structures. Nikolai's cab is smashed by falling debris, forcing Nikolai and Diane to flee down the street. A gas main explodes as the sidewalk pushes up between them. Diane saves his life after he falls and catches on fire. In the subway
tunnel, the train Evie and Joshua are riding derails after the tunnel collapses. After the earthquake stops, Diane, accompanied by Nikolai, goes back to the restaurant and finds her father fatally injured. He dies after telling her he is proud of her. In the subway, Joshua wants to leave the badly injured driver and any other survivors to get out, but before he can convince Evie and the others to leave they hear someone calling for help.
Chief Ahearn returns to his fire station to find the building partially collapsed. With the central dispatch system down, he contacts Jillian Parnell (Erika Eleniak-Goglin), a reporter for WCBS-TV
, who is flying over the city, to get an update on the situation. Both 1 Police Plaza and City Hall have collapsed, and he asks them to come pick him up. At the church, an injured Emily wakes up to find a teenage boy (Ray J
) that she helped get a job there is searching her wallet, but moves to try to find a way out after seeing she is still alive. Despite her protests, Nikolai initially remains with Diane as she tries to find her mother, but they eventually part ways. Ahearn sees that his daughter's school has collapsed, but continues on to Central Park where a temporary camp is being set up. He finds the Mayor and they agree to ignore Ahearn's resignation and put aside their differences to help the citizens of their city. A large break in the sewer is causing hundreds of gallons of water to begin flooding into the subway system.
Ahearn goes to his daughter's school after learning there are survivors. Christine is among the three survivors, but she dies during an aftershock before they can free her. At the church, Emily learns that the boy has no name, just a street name. She asks him to take the name of her late son, Clayton, who died as a baby. Shortly after, he is able to escape through a break in the ceiling and get help. Dori arrives at Danny's school where she learns he is stuck on the top floor and rescue efforts are failing. Sam arrives as Dori prepares to scale the building to save their son. Diane finds looters in her mother's apartment, but Nikolai arrives and finds a note saying her mother is at a friends. The mayor arrives at the hospital where he learns his mother is dead. He thanks Clayton for trying to help her and asks Ahearn to try to help the boy, who is despondent over not being able to save her.
In the subway, Joshua, Evie, and one other survivor, Allen (Roger R. Cross), break from the others and find a ladder out. Joshua climbs up, followed by Evie. As Allen is climbing, Joshua breaks the ladder. He confirms Evie's growing suspicions that he did kill his wife and attacks her. When he hears someone coming, he tries to escape up another ladder but an aftershock breaks it and he is killed. Evie points her rescuers to where the other survivors are waiting. Dori successfully climbs the school, where Danny has to jump into her arms. The cable breaks, but they land safely on an inflated mat below and are reunited with Sam.
At the end of the film, the city is shown still being rebuilt a year later. Mayor Lincoln and Ahearn are now close friends; Dori and Sam are shown teaching Danny how to rock-climb; and Diane is a prima ballerina and married to Nikolai.
news anchorman Chuck Scarborough
. He wrote the book to note that while a quake of the size in his story is extremely unlikely in the Big Apple, it is technically not impossible and preparation should not be completely absent from local disaster plans.
Aftershock: Earthquake in New York cost RHI Entertainment
(formerly Hallmark) $20 million dollars to produce. It was filmed in Vancouver, Canada, with digital effects and models used to simulate New York City. In the film, the Statue of Liberty
is toppled by the earthquake, an effect that required the special effects team to construct a 24-foot-tall fiberglass model. It took six weeks to complete the model, then on the first shoot, the model fell in the wrong direction and had to be recreated. Model trains were used to produce most of the subway-derailments. For the subway car's final tipping scene, the actors were harnessed into a life-sized subway car which was ripped to tip over when read. Actress Lisa Nicole Carson quipped that the harness was "like something you'd find in an S&M store".
as a two-part, four-hour miniseries
. The first part aired Sunday, November 14, and the second followed on Tuesday, November 16. It was released to VHS
format by Hallmark Entertainment on October 17, 2000; and on Region 1 DVD
by Lions Gate on February 20, 2001.
The miniseries aired in Germany as Aftershock - Das große Beben. It was released, under the title New York - Der Jüngste Tag, in a two-tape VHS
format and a single disc DVD by WVG Medien in April 2001.
for Outstanding Special Visual Effects. Michal Suchánek was nominated for a 1999 Young Artist Award
in the "Best Performance in a TV Movie or Pilot - Young Actor Age Ten or Under" category.
Sight & Sound
Danny Leigh felt the movie was "predictable histrionic", over-long, and "geologically improbably." Ray Richmond of Variety
found the film to be "roundly insipid" and a "mope opera that follows such a well-trod crisis path that viewers can set their watches by". Though he highly praised the film's special effects as being "sharp and impactful without being at all obtrusive", and noted the film had a talented cast, he heavily panned the story for being unrealistic and lacking genuineness. The New York Times
Ron Wertheimer felt the numerous subplots left the film feeling fragmented and confusing, and that it present New York in an unrealistic light, even before the earthquake hits. Noting that the film has "hints of heartfelt drama, flashes of compelling characters, [and] echoes of true connection," he felt some of the film's best moments came in its smaller scenes. He criticized Lawrence's performance, but praised Dutton and Skerrit's, particularly their interactions together, stating "their scenes provide a strong argument for letting television drama do what it does best: focus on the details of human interaction."
Tom Shales of The Washington Post
gave the film a more positive review, calling it "one of the best disaster movies ever made for television" and a "fabulously entertaining ordeal". He praised the characters for being sympathetic, the actors for portraying them well, and director Salomon for his skill in building the film's suspense.
Disaster film
A disaster film is a film genre that has an impending or ongoing disaster as its subject...
miniseries
Miniseries
A miniseries , in a serial storytelling medium, is a television show production which tells a story in a limited number of episodes. The exact number is open to interpretation; however, they are usually limited to fewer than a whole season. The term "miniseries" is generally a North American term...
that was broadcast in the United States on CBS
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...
in two parts, with the first part aired on November 14 and the second on November 16. It was released to VHS in 2000, and on DVD in 2001. It is based on a book written by Chuck Scarborough
Chuck Scarborough
Charles Bishop "Chuck" Scarborough III is an American television journalist and author. Since 1974 Scarborough has been the lead male news anchor at WNBC-TV, the New York City-based flagship station of the NBC Television Network, and has also appeared on NBC News. He currently co-anchors with...
. Starring Charles S. Dutton
Charles S. Dutton
Charles Stanley Dutton is an American stage, film, and television actor and director. He is perhaps best known for his roles as "Fortune" in the film Rudy and "Dillon" in Alien 3...
, Sharon Lawrence
Sharon Lawrence
Sharon Elizabeth Lawrence is an American television actress. She is best known for the role of Sylvia Costas Sipowicz in the Television series NYPD Blue...
, Tom Skerritt
Tom Skerritt
Thomas Roy "Tom" Skerritt is an American actor who has appeared in over 40 films and more than 200 television episodes since 1962.-Early life:...
, Lisa Nicole Carson
Lisa Nicole Carson
Lisa Nicole Carson is an American actress. She is best known for her work on U.S. television, including supporting roles in NBC's ER and Fox's Ally McBeal...
, Jennifer Garner
Jennifer Garner
Jennifer Anne Affleck , better known as Jennifer Garner, is an American actress and film producer. Garner gained recognition on television for her performance as CIA agent Sydney Bristow in the thriller drama series Alias, which aired on ABC for five seasons from 2001 to 2006...
, Rachel Ticotin
Rachel Ticotin
Rachel Ticotin is an American film and television actress.-Early life:Ticotin was born in Bronx, New York, the daughter of Iris Torres, a Puerto Rican educator, and Abe Ticotin, a Russian Jewish used car salesman. Her brother, Sahaj, is a musician and the lead singer for his rock group, Ra...
and Frederick Weller. under the direction of Mikael Salomon
Mikael Salomon
Mikael Salomon is a Danish filmmaker, cinematographer of The Abyss and Backdraft , and director of Band of Brothers ....
, the miniseries follows five groups of people in the aftermath of a large earthquake
Earthquake
An earthquake is the result of a sudden release of energy in the Earth's crust that creates seismic waves. The seismicity, seismism or seismic activity of an area refers to the frequency, type and size of earthquakes experienced over a period of time...
hitting New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
.
It was nominated for an Emmy Award
Emmy Award
An Emmy Award, often referred to simply as the Emmy, is a television production award, similar in nature to the Peabody Awards but more focused on entertainment, and is considered the television equivalent to the Academy Awards and the Grammy Awards .A majority of Emmys are presented in various...
for its special effects. While critics praised the special effects and cast, they heavily panned the film for its implausible scenario, predictability, and lack of realism.
Plot
While Dori Thorell (Sharon LawrenceSharon Lawrence
Sharon Elizabeth Lawrence is an American television actress. She is best known for the role of Sylvia Costas Sipowicz in the Television series NYPD Blue...
) and her 9-year-old son, Danny (Michal Suchánek
Michal Suchánek
Michal Suchánek is a Canadian actor, born in the former Czechoslovakia.-Biography:At the age of 12, Suchánek debuted in his first role in the The Nutcracker...
), eat breakfast, Sam Thorell (Garwin Sanford
Garwin Sanford
Garwin Sanford is a Canadian actor best known for his portrayal of Narim in Stargate SG-1 and Simon Wallis in Stargate Atlantis....
) calls from his business trip. Ballerina Diane Agostini (Jennifer Garner
Jennifer Garner
Jennifer Anne Affleck , better known as Jennifer Garner, is an American actress and film producer. Garner gained recognition on television for her performance as CIA agent Sydney Bristow in the thriller drama series Alias, which aired on ABC for five seasons from 2001 to 2006...
) is on the phone with her father when a blender shakes off the counter. Dismissing it, she ends the call and rushes off to a rehearsal session at the New York City Ballet
New York City Ballet
New York City Ballet is a ballet company founded in 1948 by choreographer George Balanchine and Lincoln Kirstein. Leon Barzin was the company's first music director. Balanchine and Jerome Robbins are considered the founding choreographers of the company...
. Public defender Evie Lincoln (Lisa Nicole Carson
Lisa Nicole Carson
Lisa Nicole Carson is an American actress. She is best known for her work on U.S. television, including supporting roles in NBC's ER and Fox's Ally McBeal...
) talks with her client Joshua Bingham (JR Bourne) about his case. That evening, tremors cause a gas leak at Diane's apartment complex. Though the electricity is still on in the evacuated building, Fire Chief Thomas Ahearn (Tom Skerritt
Tom Skerritt
Thomas Roy "Tom" Skerritt is an American actor who has appeared in over 40 films and more than 200 television episodes since 1962.-Early life:...
) sends his crew inside. The building explodes, killing several men. At a party at Gracie Mansion
Gracie Mansion
thumb|250px|Western sideGracie Mansion is the official residence of the mayor of the City of New York. Built in 1799, it is located in Carl Schurz Park, at East End Avenue and Eighty-eighth Street in Manhattan...
, Evie's grandmother Emily Lincoln (Cicely Tyson
Cicely Tyson
Cicely Tyson is an American actress. A successful stage actress, Tyson is also known for her Oscar-nominated role in the film Sounder and the television movies The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman and Roots....
) chastises her for being late. Her father, Mayor Bruce Lincoln (Charles S. Dutton
Charles S. Dutton
Charles Stanley Dutton is an American stage, film, and television actor and director. He is perhaps best known for his roles as "Fortune" in the film Rudy and "Dillon" in Alien 3...
), coerces her into going to a job interview
Job interview
A job interview is a process in which a potential employee is evaluated by an employer for prospective employment in their company, organization, or firm. During this process, the employer hopes to determine whether or not the applicant is suitable for the job.-Role:A job interview typically...
at a big law firm.
The next day, Ahearn drops his daughter, Christine, off at high school. She expresses annoyance at his quitting to get "revenge" against the "stupid" mayor over budgeting issues. At the courthouse, Joshua is found not guilty of murdering his invalid wife. Diane meets her father for lunch to get money. When she leaves, she catches a cab driven by recent Russian immigrant Nikolai Karvoski (Fred Weller
Fred Weller
Frederick Weller is an American actor.- Personal life :Weller was born in New Orleans and is a cousin of actor Peter Weller. He is a graduate of Jesuit High School, a Catholic all-boys high school in New Orleans, and the University of North Carolina. He married Ali Marsh on September 6, 2003...
). An earthquake hits the city, toppling many buildings and structures. Nikolai's cab is smashed by falling debris, forcing Nikolai and Diane to flee down the street. A gas main explodes as the sidewalk pushes up between them. Diane saves his life after he falls and catches on fire. In the subway
New York City Subway
The New York City Subway is a rapid transit system owned by the City of New York and leased to the New York City Transit Authority, a subsidiary agency of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority and also known as MTA New York City Transit...
tunnel, the train Evie and Joshua are riding derails after the tunnel collapses. After the earthquake stops, Diane, accompanied by Nikolai, goes back to the restaurant and finds her father fatally injured. He dies after telling her he is proud of her. In the subway, Joshua wants to leave the badly injured driver and any other survivors to get out, but before he can convince Evie and the others to leave they hear someone calling for help.
Chief Ahearn returns to his fire station to find the building partially collapsed. With the central dispatch system down, he contacts Jillian Parnell (Erika Eleniak-Goglin), a reporter for WCBS-TV
WCBS-TV
WCBS-TV, channel 2, is the flagship station of the CBS television network, located in New York City. The station's studios are located within the CBS Broadcast Center and its transmitter is atop the Empire State Building, both in Midtown Manhattan....
, who is flying over the city, to get an update on the situation. Both 1 Police Plaza and City Hall have collapsed, and he asks them to come pick him up. At the church, an injured Emily wakes up to find a teenage boy (Ray J
Ray J
William Ray Norwood Jr. , better known by his stage name Ray J, is an American singer, songwriter, record producer and actor.-Early life:...
) that she helped get a job there is searching her wallet, but moves to try to find a way out after seeing she is still alive. Despite her protests, Nikolai initially remains with Diane as she tries to find her mother, but they eventually part ways. Ahearn sees that his daughter's school has collapsed, but continues on to Central Park where a temporary camp is being set up. He finds the Mayor and they agree to ignore Ahearn's resignation and put aside their differences to help the citizens of their city. A large break in the sewer is causing hundreds of gallons of water to begin flooding into the subway system.
Ahearn goes to his daughter's school after learning there are survivors. Christine is among the three survivors, but she dies during an aftershock before they can free her. At the church, Emily learns that the boy has no name, just a street name. She asks him to take the name of her late son, Clayton, who died as a baby. Shortly after, he is able to escape through a break in the ceiling and get help. Dori arrives at Danny's school where she learns he is stuck on the top floor and rescue efforts are failing. Sam arrives as Dori prepares to scale the building to save their son. Diane finds looters in her mother's apartment, but Nikolai arrives and finds a note saying her mother is at a friends. The mayor arrives at the hospital where he learns his mother is dead. He thanks Clayton for trying to help her and asks Ahearn to try to help the boy, who is despondent over not being able to save her.
In the subway, Joshua, Evie, and one other survivor, Allen (Roger R. Cross), break from the others and find a ladder out. Joshua climbs up, followed by Evie. As Allen is climbing, Joshua breaks the ladder. He confirms Evie's growing suspicions that he did kill his wife and attacks her. When he hears someone coming, he tries to escape up another ladder but an aftershock breaks it and he is killed. Evie points her rescuers to where the other survivors are waiting. Dori successfully climbs the school, where Danny has to jump into her arms. The cable breaks, but they land safely on an inflated mat below and are reunited with Sam.
At the end of the film, the city is shown still being rebuilt a year later. Mayor Lincoln and Ahearn are now close friends; Dori and Sam are shown teaching Danny how to rock-climb; and Diane is a prima ballerina and married to Nikolai.
Production
The film is based on a novel written by New YorkNew York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
news anchorman Chuck Scarborough
Chuck Scarborough
Charles Bishop "Chuck" Scarborough III is an American television journalist and author. Since 1974 Scarborough has been the lead male news anchor at WNBC-TV, the New York City-based flagship station of the NBC Television Network, and has also appeared on NBC News. He currently co-anchors with...
. He wrote the book to note that while a quake of the size in his story is extremely unlikely in the Big Apple, it is technically not impossible and preparation should not be completely absent from local disaster plans.
Aftershock: Earthquake in New York cost RHI Entertainment
RHI Entertainment
RHI Entertainment , formerly known as Hallmark Entertainment, is an American producer of television movies and miniseries, founded in 1979 by Robert Halmi Jr. and Robert Halmi Sr. as Robert Halmi Incorporated....
(formerly Hallmark) $20 million dollars to produce. It was filmed in Vancouver, Canada, with digital effects and models used to simulate New York City. In the film, the Statue of Liberty
Statue of Liberty
The Statue of Liberty is a colossal neoclassical sculpture on Liberty Island in New York Harbor, designed by Frédéric Bartholdi and dedicated on October 28, 1886...
is toppled by the earthquake, an effect that required the special effects team to construct a 24-foot-tall fiberglass model. It took six weeks to complete the model, then on the first shoot, the model fell in the wrong direction and had to be recreated. Model trains were used to produce most of the subway-derailments. For the subway car's final tipping scene, the actors were harnessed into a life-sized subway car which was ripped to tip over when read. Actress Lisa Nicole Carson quipped that the harness was "like something you'd find in an S&M store".
Release
Aftershock: Earthquake in New York was initially aired in the United States in 1999 on CBSCBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...
as a two-part, four-hour miniseries
Miniseries
A miniseries , in a serial storytelling medium, is a television show production which tells a story in a limited number of episodes. The exact number is open to interpretation; however, they are usually limited to fewer than a whole season. The term "miniseries" is generally a North American term...
. The first part aired Sunday, November 14, and the second followed on Tuesday, November 16. It was released to VHS
VHS
The Video Home System is a consumer-level analog recording videocassette standard developed by Victor Company of Japan ....
format by Hallmark Entertainment on October 17, 2000; and on Region 1 DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....
by Lions Gate on February 20, 2001.
The miniseries aired in Germany as Aftershock - Das große Beben. It was released, under the title New York - Der Jüngste Tag, in a two-tape VHS
VHS
The Video Home System is a consumer-level analog recording videocassette standard developed by Victor Company of Japan ....
format and a single disc DVD by WVG Medien in April 2001.
Reception
In 2000, Aftershock: Earthquake in New York was nominated for the Emmy AwardEmmy Award
An Emmy Award, often referred to simply as the Emmy, is a television production award, similar in nature to the Peabody Awards but more focused on entertainment, and is considered the television equivalent to the Academy Awards and the Grammy Awards .A majority of Emmys are presented in various...
for Outstanding Special Visual Effects. Michal Suchánek was nominated for a 1999 Young Artist Award
Young Artist Award
The Young Artist Award is an accolade bestowed by the Young Artist Foundation, a non-profit organization founded in 1978 to recognize and award excellence of youth performers, and to provide scholarships for young artists who may be physically and/or financially challenged.The Young Artist...
in the "Best Performance in a TV Movie or Pilot - Young Actor Age Ten or Under" category.
Sight & Sound
Sight & Sound
Sight & Sound is a British monthly film magazine published by the British Film Institute .Sight & Sound was first published in 1932 and in 1934 management of the magazine was handed to the nascent BFI, which still publishes the magazine today...
Danny Leigh felt the movie was "predictable histrionic", over-long, and "geologically improbably." Ray Richmond of Variety
Variety (magazine)
Variety is an American weekly entertainment-trade magazine founded in New York City, New York, in 1905 by Sime Silverman. With the rise of the importance of the motion-picture industry, Daily Variety, a daily edition based in Los Angeles, California, was founded by Silverman in 1933. In 1998, the...
found the film to be "roundly insipid" and a "mope opera that follows such a well-trod crisis path that viewers can set their watches by". Though he highly praised the film's special effects as being "sharp and impactful without being at all obtrusive", and noted the film had a talented cast, he heavily panned the story for being unrealistic and lacking genuineness. The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
Ron Wertheimer felt the numerous subplots left the film feeling fragmented and confusing, and that it present New York in an unrealistic light, even before the earthquake hits. Noting that the film has "hints of heartfelt drama, flashes of compelling characters, [and] echoes of true connection," he felt some of the film's best moments came in its smaller scenes. He criticized Lawrence's performance, but praised Dutton and Skerrit's, particularly their interactions together, stating "their scenes provide a strong argument for letting television drama do what it does best: focus on the details of human interaction."
Tom Shales of The Washington Post
The Washington Post
The Washington Post is Washington, D.C.'s largest newspaper and its oldest still-existing paper, founded in 1877. Located in the capital of the United States, The Post has a particular emphasis on national politics. D.C., Maryland, and Virginia editions are printed for daily circulation...
gave the film a more positive review, calling it "one of the best disaster movies ever made for television" and a "fabulously entertaining ordeal". He praised the characters for being sympathetic, the actors for portraying them well, and director Salomon for his skill in building the film's suspense.