Fire of Love (2022)

Fascinating - Fire of Love review by sb

FILM & REVIEW Fascinating documentary about Maurice and Katia Krafft - a couple of volcanologists who travelled the world documenting and filming active volcanic eruptions. The film sets its stall out early telling us they were both killed by a pyroclastic flow in Japan in 1991 so every adventure they go on has that knowledge built in. The footage is astounding - a lot if it is hair-raising as they stand so close to vast lakes of exploding lava but as they point out the “red” volcanoes are relatively safe as the lava flows does follow preset channels - it’s the “grey” ones which can explode without warning causing huge devastation. This type was at Mt St Helen’s and also destroyed Pompeii - and was the type in Japan that ended their lives. Their work is also very useful - in 1985 in Columbia the authorities ignored their warnings and 25,000 villagers were swept away -subsequent evacuations based on their studies saved thousands of lives. It’s uses an effective ambient soundtrack but does have a ponderous, breathless, clunky voice-over narration that does become annoying - fortunately the couple themselves and the extraordinary images make up for this - on the Disney channel - 4/5