Hard Rain

There's a rain storm in a little town in Indiana. The town is flooded and the sheriff (Randy Quaid) and his deputies are evacuating the town's people. It turns out that the sheriff just lost the re-election, but he's still the sheriff for the next little bit. They have only a slight problem with the couple that owns the bait shop. Henry and Doreen (Richard A. Dysart and Betty White)  are setting traps for the looters. Other than that everything is going fine. That is until Jim (Morgan Freeman) and his gang decide to rob an armored truck that had been collecting money from banks along the river. Three million dollars worth.

Tom and Charlie (Christian Slater and  Edward Asner) are the two guards in the truck. Charlie is shot in a firefight when one of the crooks gets jumpy. Tom takes the money and hides it in a cemetery and then hides in a church, where he is then hit on the head by Karen (Minnie Driver) who thinks he's a looter. She was setting the pumps in the church so there's little rain damage because she worked for the last eight months to restore it... or built it...or...um....she put a lot of work on it and doesn't want it destroyed. She brings him to the sheriff and Tom tells them what's happening. The sheriff and Wayne (Mark Rolston) go and check on his story Karen and Phil (Peter Murmik) go back to fill the pumps on the church. Well, Karen pushed Phil out of the boat and then goes to the church.  Tom, however is locked in the jail.

Hank (Wayne Duvall), at the damn, is forced to open another levy to stop the damn from breaking and the town is inundated with more water, causing it to jump over the sand bags. Karen goes back to save Tom and they are found by Jim and the Gang.  They manage to escape and almost get caught in one of Henry and Doreen's traps.  Henry gives Tom their boat so he can go back to the truck and wait for the National Guard. Only he gets caught by Jim and the Gang and is forced to show them were the money is. Only it is no longer there.

Turns out that the sheriff is tired of eating shit all day (his words) and is taking the money. He calls up Hank and the four of them wage war on Tom, Karen and Jim and the Gang, killing the Gang.  What follows is a very long fight scene with a few breaks here and there allowing Tom and Jim to bond and Karen to kill off Wayne.  In the end the sheriff and his Gang die, Tom saves Karen, Jim gets away with a single bag of money and the church is pretty much destroyed. 

I really liked this movie. I watched it a bunch of times years ago and when I saw it for like seven bucks at the DVD store I couldn't resist. Its still just as good as I remember.  I love Morgan Freeman's character. He's completely focused on his goal (the money) and won't let a few things like a flood and gun totting deputies get in his way. There is such a depth to the character that immediately draws you in. I love Freeman as an actor.  I love Slater as an actor too. I think he is well suited for action movies.

The CGI is a little bad and the ending is slightly cheesy and I'm slightly dubious of the fact that Tom and Charlie were complaining about their pay. I would think that you would want to pay people in this position well so they don't have thoughts of stealing money. That's the only major complaint I have about this movie. Other than that, it was excellent.

Grade: 8.5/10