Trial by Fire (2008)

I love this movie so much

Touches You

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

This is one of those B movies that you find yourself stuck into on a Sunday afternoon when you're hungover. It actually wasn't that horrible; lots of hunky firemen, moderately bad special effects, just the right amount of cheese and Brooke Burns (who I may have just developed a girl crush on.) She looks amazing here and isn't afraid to get dirty, obviously doing most of the training scenes herself -I do remember from her Baywatch days that she was a triathlete in real life, not that I watched Baywatch or anything.Brooke plays Kristin, a woman who joins the fire department to follow in her father's footsteps. When her Captain perishes in a fire Kristen is unfairly forced to take the blame and in the aftermath of that tragedy makes it her mission to become the first female ever to be accepted into the elite ranks of the Missoula Smokejumpers.We follow her through the grueling, four week training program, struggles with the other members of the team and watch her steely determination as she learns to jump out of planes, into the flames and save the day. 07.11

Trial By Fire is not a perfect movie, nor does it try to be. The story may be unrealistic with a fair number of plot holes, the script may have its weak spots, the pace may be lagging and some of the character development may be lacking. Flaws aside, I didn't think it was that bad. The film is shot quite well, the soundtrack and sound give some atmosphere and the stunts are bold and daring. I love the titular character as well, I just love how tough and brave she is, and the acting while not award-worthy is reasonable with Brooke Burns doing a good job in the lead role. Overall, not great but I didn't think it was that bad either. 6/10 Bethany Cox

I actually liked this movie. Not all of the actors were wonderful but it's a low budget film, I've seen worse. It's one of those overcoming-obstacles films where you root for the girl to show them what she's made of. The lead woman (Brook Burns) is pretty good, she's a genuine tough-girl without being fake or overdoing it and works out the sometimes lagging script to get the story done. I liked how the film seemed to make the most of their action sequences; with airplanes and skydivers, and their creative effects with the fires despite an obviously limited budget to make it more realistic. They used a low-key romance without going overboard into the mushy stuff, for once this wasn't merely an attempt to sell a film based on sex-appeal. It reminded me of GI Jane in that Kristen Scott (Burns) never gives up on her dream to be a smoke-jumper despite overwhelming obstacles and the disapproval of her friends and family. It's a good movie for those who like to be inspired by a female lead that is believable as a contender for a job such as a smoke-jumper. I would like to see more films like this in the future.

Former Baywatch babe Brook Burns plays the role of Kristin Scoot, a woman seeking success in an apparently all-male world of firefighters, and, according to this flick, she does find success, again and again and again, only to meet criticism and scorn from her all-male co-workers, until she finds herself in a situation where they all feel overwhelmingly compelled to applaud her at the very end (of the flick).I can usually overlook a few technical errors, a few shabby bits of computer graphic imagery, a few story-line flaws, or a few shots of inept acting, and still enjoy a decent story line. Sadly, I must say that even the story line was a failure, as it completely failed to develop any of the characters enough to be understood, much less be sympathized with, and by no means empathized with.The very best thing about this flick is that actress Brooke Burns still displays her patently stunning smile. Of course, that is also one of the worst things about this flick, as she displays that smile in no fewer than a dozen moments where in real life, anyone's ability to smile more than a very weak smirk would likely mark him (or her) as a lunatic.Another thing done quite poorly in this film were the computer generated forest fires and flames. Clearly, filming without real flames is a lot safer for actors and actresses who are not certified safe enough to perform stunts, and it drops the cost of the overall production, but, to see a scene where our young heroine Kristin crawls on her belly beneath the blazing trunk of a fallen tree -- and then PAUSES -- without receiving third-degree burns to her back, the back of her head, her neck, legs, and arms, is just plain insidious, because of all the young heroine worshipers in the audience who might just try a similar-looking REAL stunt of their own.Nor did many of the computer-generated parachute drops appear to be very real, but at least those didn't look any less dangerous than they can be in real life.As for the story: I happen to have been trained in my youth as a forest-fire fighter, not a jumper, but in my state's forest-fire-fighting reserve. My job was mainly to cut fire lines and stay alive. I was also trained somewhat in the realm of search and rescue. In this flick's opening scenes, the heroine is portrayed as turning off her radio in order to listen for a missing person's shout, which is expected, but NEVER would you turn off your most valuable lifeline without first broadcasting your intention and your location, just in case for some reason you fail to get it turned back on, and NEVER EVER EVER would you attempt to actually perform such a rescue as our heroine without indeed turning it back on to alert everyone withing range of both your success in locating the victim and what you were about to do. In real life, our pretty heroine would have been fired the very moment she got back to camp, regardless of who her father might have happened to be; she would never have been allowed to be put into another unsafe situation, like the next firefighting scene which claims the heroine's father's life.But the very worst part of this flick is the way the heroine's father is portrayed on the day of his impending doom, being the very last day of his twenty-six year career in a small-city fire department, after having been given his retirement party, and after having been told not to report thereafter, out of a not-really-all-that-superstitious belief in bad luck to do so. Yet, there he is, on his very last day, not only singing and humming, but actually celebrating the alleged GOOD luck that on the very last day of his career, another call comes in. This, in my opinion, is VERY bad taste. I have never met a career fire fighter of any age who has ever reacted so brazenly insensitive as that. All real fire fighters I know acknowledge themselves as being nothing short of a very necessary evil in today's society. They realize that the very fact that anybody actually pays them for the job they do is because they combat the much greater evil of anybody losing life, limb, and/or property, if it can be prevented. They don't celebrate anything that might cause harm to anybody else. At most, they celebrate the opportunity to exercise their training, but they NEVER call it good luck. Ever.Again, in my youth, I was trained to be a firefighter, not just in forests, but my little cow town's volunteer department. Between the time I became old enough to enroll, and the day I left town for college, we had absolutely zero fires and nobody in need of being rescued by us. As a result of that, I was never actually paid so much as a penny in exchange for all the mandatory meetings, training and public-relations activities that took up so much of my otherwise free time, yet THAT is exactly what a real firefighter calls good luck. The firefighting lacked authenticity, the acting (directing) was mostly sophomoric and unconvincing, and the story was just barely above becoming absurd. If you're looking for an authentic movie about firefighting and search and rescue, or a realistic role model flick, this is NOT the movie you are looking for. It could have become a thrilling motion picture with a very powerful message about how to hurdle the frustrations of discrimination. I am afraid, however, that all it will become now, is an very unsafe role model story for pre-pubescent girls.It's greatest value lies in the entertainment value derived from its absurdity.