I actually liked this movie! The action wasn't the best but it was good. Great action scenes and William Forsythe shined as a bad guy! Howie Long did excellent as a firefighter trying to shut down the flames while battling prisoners. A few 'hokey' scenes didn't really bother me. Hey, it's just a movie. Sit back and enjoy it!

Reckless action, great villian, lost me at the end.

Awful. Terrible acting, subpar over the top soundtrack, and terrible pacing. The editing & cinematography isn't good either. No wonder Howie Long's career never took off. I don't know who is worse him or the stupid villian. I thought this was going to be like a drama telling what parachuting firefighters go through based on the opening title card. But it devolves into a brainless stupid idea prison break action thiller that takes place during a forest fire. It never knows how to make the firefighter/disaster movie asetics work with the action plot. There is hardly and character development put into Howie Long. If anything the villian is the main focus more than anything. The end fight is terrible and laughably over the top as is the whole movie. More than anything this is just a terrible idea for a movie to begin with. Skip This.

I was a dumb kid when this came out and thought it was the best movie ever. The only thing I remember from this movie is when the bad guys are walking on the ridge and badass Howie Long knows they are full of shit because the fire will burn up to the ridge. Phile.

Firestorm seems to be trying to put me over on how cool fighting forest fires are. The trained few, jump out of planes, fight criminals, throw axes and wrestle manly Russian men from the 13th Warrior. This is a muscle-bound dream, isn't it. Punching trees with our fists while we rub together our biggest of muscles to create fire. Of course, the fire we create is just as awesome as we are, so it also fights other fires like a boss. I think what I am trying to say is that Firestorm seems a bit of a stretch. Now, I am not saying that the men and women who fight forest fires in real life don't put themselves in danger while trying to save lives, homes, and peoples lifestyles. I am saying the movie Firestorm may not be super truthful in its execution. Although, that over exaggeration is what makes it great. Riding dirt bikes over cliffs, wrestling in a burning building and smashing peoples heads through boats to burn their faces off during a "firestorm" almost push this movie into so bad it's good territory. There are some laughable moments, and even laugh out loud moments that make me really wish it went that extra mile to be fun. It's almost the "Stone Cold" of fighting forest fires. I'd say Firestorm is the type of movie you shut your brain off and enjoy, but I don't think the movie gets to the point where your brain ever turns on. Star rating side, this movie is entertaining, just not for the right reasons.

The movie is really cheesy but its atleast action filled.

An attempt to turn a firefighter into and action hero, and an attempt to turn Howie Long into a movie star. It failed on both counts.

It was an intense adventure. Thankfully, there was a happy ending.

1/11/2013: Ok. Some ok action and an ok story. Not the greatest of acting though.

So ex-NFL player Howie Long got his big action man break in the Travolta thriller 'Broken Arrow' in 1996, this inevitably lead to his own specially made silly action vehicle. Although there are a few well known faces here simply to bolster the acting skills on show, its basically the Howie Long show yet he shows off no muscles throughout. So four years ago the main villain stole four million Dollars and hid it deep within the forest. He now decides to break out of jail with some colleges during a big forest fire which one of his compadres on the outside started. Naturally a female is taken hostage and its up to the lone 'smokejumper' to save the day with his mighty axe. The term 'smokejumper' is actually what they call these guys that are trained to jump from helicopters into fires to save people, its not me being sarcastic. But this is what's so funny about this film, right from the get go we are shown the banal camaraderie and makeup of the small team. These smokejumpers led by Long are your typical team of Hollywood characters, the attractive female, the mouthy young male, the wiser vet and Long who is the big butch guy. Only thing missing is the token black guy. Luckily we don't have to put up with this A-Team type cliched machoism as the action centres on Long surviving in the wilderness against the bad guys. The bad guys are easily the more interesting bunch with William Forsythe as their homicidal leader. Gotta give credit to Forsythe as he always makes such a riveting nasty villain, his fierce chubby looks are just perfect the way he snarls and grimaces when he gets mad, and in this he just about kills anyone. Check the early performance for Barry Pepper as one of the bad guys. The whole idea for this film is so thin really, its just an everyday action movie but its set within a huge forest fire. It just comes across as trying to make another field of US rescue workers out to be cool equipment wearing top guns. Of course Long uses all his trained boyscout methods to beat the bad guys whilst curiously never actually getting into any good fights, well not many. I was gonna compare this to 'Backdraft' but its not really like that, that had some sense about it whilst this is complete violent nonsense. Despite that there are numerous visual moments which look pretty similar and its worth noting that Scott Glenn plays almost the same type of role in this as he does in 'Backdraft'. The whole thing is predictable as hell and can't even come up with any decent visuals to help you along. Long is a weak leading man even though he has the look of one and things that happen along the way just raise questions, but its hardly a thinker, just dumb.

My most hated film of all time its beyond me why a big studio like 20th Century Fox where behind this trash.

firestorm is a cliffhanger type thriller starring Howie Long as Jesse Graves a heroic fire fighter who is up against a group of escaped convicts led by the Psycotic Randell who has kidnapped a bird watcher played by Suzi Amis and has caused a giant fire that is turning into a firestorm.now Jesse must now save the hostage stop the fire and take care of Randell. firestorm is quite a fun little thriller Howie Long was quite a good hero shame he didn't make anymore action films after this.William Forsythe was absolutely brilliant as the main bad guy Randell William normally plays decent bad guys anyway like in out for justice and stone cold.even Scott Glenn is in it. to end the review firestorm is a well made action thriller a bit clichéd but still cool.

Howie Long is no Brian Bosworth.

As far as former NFL defensive players, Howie is just a little better than Brian Bosworth as far as action stars go, but just alittle. Long plays a firefighter who fights fire out west in some National or State Park. One of his fellow firefighters, William Forsythe, sets a fire as cover for a prison escape and its up to Long to catch them, save his girlfriend, and stop the fire all the while explaining to the audience the dangers of a "firestorm." The acting and dialogue are terrible but the fire action scenes are pretty cool.

It's shocking that this was ever theatrically released. Hilariously bad but decently shot action fluff.

Throwing a chainsaw at a truck full of psycho criminals was cool. But that's all.

If this movie took itself seriously it might've been real good. It had a good concept and an awesome bad guy but every scene with howie long was corny as fucking hell. When he was on screen I thought i was watching a family film. |I don't blame him doh, thats the writers and or directors fault cuz Howie was awesome in broken arrow

Apparently someone at 20th Century Fox saw something in former football star Howie Long after his supporting role in "Broken Arrow" that screamed "new action superstar". The result of that genius foresight is "Firestorm", a routine flick in which the "new action superstar" is constantly dwarfed by the special effects and the action. The opening moments are particularly impressive, and while it's obvious the forest fire is CGI, it doesn't feel that way. Because it's so spectacularly filmed by cinematographer-turned-director Dean Semler, I thought maybe the movie would buck the odds and be something special. But ten the plot kicks in. It's your basic cons-on-the-run story that borrows heavily from other, better flicks like "Shoot to Kill", "Cliffhanger" and even "Broken Arrow". Long is certainly good-looking enough to be a star, but he's sorely lacking in charisma and comic timing. He's stiff and heavy-handed, and he's not helped in the least by the weak writing. And any good action film is defined by its villain, and that's yet another problem I had with this. William Forsythe can be a great bad guy, as he proved in "Out For Justice" among others. But here he's reduced to tired wise cracks and predictable bursts of violence. He's better than this weak material. It's obvious that more thought went into staging the action sequences than character development or writing a script, and I guess that means at least "Firestorm" isn't a total loss. There are some gripping moments here, but I couldn't get into the story.

u think howie long is a robot on fox nfl pregame? u should see him act

Not at all as terrible as I thought it was going to be. Interesting concept mixed with some halfway decent action scenes makes for a decent movie. Howie Long does a pretty good job as Jesse and William Forsythe is good as the sadistic madman, Shaye.