Cave in! (TV Movie 1983) Poster

(1983 TV Movie)

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5/10
"Cave In!" has an impact of 3 (out of five) on the "cliched disaster movie" scale!
Coventry13 August 2020
I'm mad about old-school 70s/early 80s disaster movies. In fact, I've seen so many of them that they are all starting to look alike, and even developed a sort of five points rating scale to determine exactly how cliched but entertaining they are. Make no mistake, though, as the scale doesn't reflect film quality, and is only an indicator of how film in question qualifies as fantastic entertainment with all the joyous clichés and stereotypes.

Condition #1: without producer Irwin Allen, there wasn't a budget for special effects and thus no movie. It's a genuine Allen flick, all right. However, "Cave-In!" is a TV-production, so obviously it's less spectacular and less fierce than the legendary producer's big-screen hits. The collapsing caverns aren't very convincing, and the body count is quite low, so I'll give it half a point simply for the "Irwin Allen presents..." label. Condition #2: all disaster movies star one major star (Charlton Heston and Paul Newman were prime choices) and a long list of "secondary" stars (like Ernest Borgnine, Leslie Nielsen...). Again, for reasons linked to the TV-movie status, there isn't a major star, but Leslie Nielsen is present and, especially near the end, rises to the top as a genuine hero. Besides him, the only impressive name in the cast is Ray Milland. The lesser known actors and actresses (Dennis Cole, Susan Sullivan, James Olson...) still do their best, so I'll be very generous and hand out a score of 0.75 for this aspect. Condition #3: The characters are usually split into two camps with completely opposite ideals and/or initiatives. This condition isn't applicable here. The group trapped in the underground caverns is too small to be split in two, and their situation doesn't allow for anyone to deny the danger or to minimalize the impact. There is a fugitive criminal in the group, though, and he causes some additional trouble. 0.25 points. Condition #4: Regardless what type of disaster we're dealing with, variants of the exact same perilous situations are always applicable. Pass, for sure! In order to escape from the caves, the group must swim through mazes, cross ramshackle bridges and walk through hot-water geysers. Full point! Condition #5: always remember that, when the situation appears to be at its worst, it can and will still get even worse! Well, yes, but I don't want to grant the point here, since none of the complicating factors have anything to do with the collapsing caverns. All the lead characters struggle with personal issues that get illustrated via dull flashbacks. The tour guide and the senator have a romantic history together, Leslie Nielsen is a suspended cop who allegedly didn't do enough to save the life of his partner and Ray Milland is a tyrannical father who sabotages all the potential relationships of his daughter. Nice try, but not nearly disastrous enough.

If we sum it up, "Cave-In!" scores 2.5 out of 5 on rating scale for disaster movies. I'll round it up to 3, because there's an exclamation mark in the title, which always helps to emphasize the seriousness of a disaster even more. What does the rating mean? Absolutely nothing, expect that "Cave-In!" is worth seeing even though there are far better disaster movies available out there.
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5/10
A disaster movie that is a disaster ..........
merklekranz25 May 2012
First, I have a suggestion for anyone tempted to watch this tepid disaster film. Since every one of the numerous flashbacks is nothing more than a time filler, whenever the screen blurs for a flashback immediately hit the fast forward button. This is how bad it gets, the caverns look fake, the "disasters" are about as scary as a basket of bunnies, and the caverns are miraculously lighted by who knows what, even though they should be in total darkness. The only redeeming factor is a typical smarmy performance from Ray Milland, and Susan Sullivan is effective "eye candy" in tight slacks. One other thing, caves do not cave in, mines cave in. Perhaps this should be called "Mine Cave-In"? - MERK
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Worse than "Airport '75" & "Earthquake"
richard.fuller110 August 2004
Warning: Spoilers
There are awful disaster movies from the seventies. Motion-picture-wise, "Earthquake" and "Airport '75" are held as the two worst.

On Tv, there would be "Fire!" and "Flood!" during the seventies, as well as "The Night the Bridge Fell Down" and "Hanging By A Thread".

Then there was this atrocity from the early eighties, AFTER Airplane! was lampooning the genre in theatres.

About the only cliche missing here was a dog.

Dennis Cole was the hero ranger, Susan Sullivan his woman, Leslie Neilsen the disillusioned scientist or teacher who had his supportive wife, Ray Milland was the old man who had interferred in his daughter's life and she found the all-telling letter in an envelope when he took off his jacket to swim through a cavern.

James Olsen was the criminal who was on the lam.

There was the usual dangers, almost like a game or something. The underwater swim, oh no! -- Susan has her foot caught, how will she get free in the water?

The so-called 'trapped foot' bit was cute as it seemed to be a few rocks were suddenly covering her foot.

After they had gotten almost out, Olsen makes his move. It seems the characters hadn't bonded well after this experience after all.

So now they depart, Sullivan and Cole happily ever after, Neilsen and the missus happily ever after (ready to give it one more try!) and Milland rejected by his daughter who has learned "the truth!".

The Cave In changed their lives, it seems.

It watches like Airplane without the jokes actually.
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3/10
Just when you think you found the worst disaster movie, another one like this pops up.
mark.waltz1 February 2022
Warning: Spoilers
Every time you need a pair of people in this Irwin Allen TV movie, they bring up a soap opera subplot, complete with flashbacks, and they become laughably bad every time they are introduced. The cast as the credits roll by bring chuckles on too, from Ray Milland in one of his patent grouchy old men roles to Leslie Nielson, surely so serious, and Susan Sullivan, turning around in her introductory scene like Maggie in the opening credits of "Falcon Crest". Fans of the nighttime cereal will be amused when she has to swim underwater and gets her foot caught on a rock, similar to something that happened on "Falcon Crest". Then there's a criminal on the run, James Olson, planning to use the disaster to keep the group underground as hostages, getting angry every time someone tries to tell him that he's taking a wrong turn.

I expected Abraham Lincoln to turn up in the shoot-out scene with Leslie Nielsen just like he did every week on the short-lived "Police Squad". Dennis Cole is the leading man, a mine inspector who warns Sullivan (a politician) of potential disaster. Of course they were romantically involved prior to this situation, and that's more soap opera to be dealt with. Of course in the meantime, there's a pond filled with boiling water that they have to Cross by the Rocks, an underground entrance to a cavern that is their way out that they all have the swim through, and the rickety bridge that couldn't hold a child's wage let alone a human adult weight. Each segment of disaster ends as if it's a 1940s serial, and while it's nail-biting at times, it's often silly.

The flashbacks are uninteresting and unintentionally silly, with Milland's daughter (Sheila Larken) feeling suffocated by him, and he is laughably bad, hasn't given mostly over the top, lousy performances since the late 50's. His character is a know-it-all who never shuts up, the type of person who do not want to be trapped within a cave-in. Well maybe not a cave where there's a canyon that goes down thousands of feet that someone ends up being tempted to push him in. Nielsen is at least spared the indignities I've been overly dramatic, laughable part, his issue being memories of watching his partner died which has created issues with his wife Julie Sommars. Yes attention of the that's if he's people are trapped and being held by a crazy man is intense, and for claustrophobic people, that's going to make it even worse. But Irwin Allen hadn't had a good disaster movie for the big screen or TV since "The Towering Inferno", and this indicates why he all of a sudden moved theatrical films to the small screen.
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7/10
Good? Not by a long shot, but they don't make 'em like this anymore, so...
james-joseph-meeker13 April 2019
Utterly predictable Irwin Allen made for TV disaster flic does the trick for those of us who quite literally can't get enough of this stuff. Cheesy phony sets, stilted dialogue, pointless flashbacks and senseless "tension" between characters - Cave In! has it all plus Leslie Nielsen as the disgraced former cop and a soundtrack that lifts entire motifs from Bernard Herrmann's iconic score for Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo. Your mileage may vary, but I loved it.
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8/10
Irwin Allen does it again!!
JimmyL55555 August 2005
After the enormous success of his 2 blockbuster disaster films "Poseidon Adventure" and "Towering Inferno," Irwin Allen had switched studios from 20th Century Fox to Warner Bros., and the TV-movies and theatrical movies he produced with his new home did not match the scope of those two, and you could say they are filled with his repetitive clichés, but are still good, solid, suspenseful disaster movies, and CAVE IN! is no exception.

Filmed in 1979 but not broadcast until 1983, this lesser-known Irwin Allen disaster movie delivers the goods. However, the flashbacks kind of drag it through the mud a little and you lose the momentum, and that's why it gets an "8" rating. But if you could tolerate the flashbacks, you got a good, suspenseful disaster movie.

A handful of tourists visiting a cave experiences a cave-in and are trapped, and have to trudge through obstacles to make it to safety. And if that wasn't bad enough, they have to deal with an escaped criminal traveling with them. It's a shame that Warner Bros. doesn't release this movie commercially.

I bought a VHS copy of this movie off eBay from someone who taped it off the Family Channel sometime during the 1980s, and I hope he'll have more copies available. So, if you're a fan of disaster movies, and Irwin Allen in particular, DON'T MISS THIS ONE!!
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Irwin's Worst Disaster Movie Ever!
StuOz2 February 2005
Irwin Allen disaster movie about a cave in.

If you look at my review history you will see that I have reviewed many Irwin Allen productions, some are liked more than others, but I manage to find SOMETHING in all of them. Cave In is another story.

It stinks!

I saw it when it came out and I saw it more recently. It stank both times.

The story, the effects, the music, the characters, everything stinks! The only mildly memorable element is that Leslie Nielsen is here and this actor is known for sending up this kind of material in later years. A 1965 Irwin Allen Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea episode called "And Five Of Us Are Left" did a better job of filming a Cave In than this half baked TV movie.
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