This movie defines 'Corny'. Continuity doesn't seem to be a strong point in the making of this film. Little quirks here and there such as: a woman walks in and catches 2 guys stealing a TV, she yells, they drop the TV, she runs, they disappear.... later, the broken TV vanishes too. Some of the 'emotional' reactions, as well as actions, by these actors is also over the top. You watch them do something, or react to something and you just have to sit in awe: There's just no way any sane person would do that, or waste THAT much time telling a story, or plain old goofing off, in an emergency. The musical score in coordination with some of the scenes is almost comical. And, finally, if you like 'in-the-nick-of-time' scenes, you'll be in heaven.

I bought this on DVD because it was cheap and I couldn't find anything else, but I pretty much thought it would be wasted money. But this movie is surprisingly well written, effective and does its best to avoid disaster movie clichés, albeit not always successful. Like its predecessor "EarthQuake" it focuses on the effect of a disastrous earthquake on the lives of several groups of people whom struggle to survive and find loved ones amongst the devastation. The stories range in degrees of interests, ranging from engrossing to rather weak and familiar. The one that stands out the most is about a pampered rich girl and a young Russian taxi driver whom takes it upon himself to protect her. The contrast is interesting as she finds herself in a totally alien world of sudden death and chaos while her companion seems wearily used to such calamities, and instead of panicking he immediately tries to regain control of their situation. As far as the special effects go it doesn't have all the flashy effects other quake movies do but what it does show is pretty convincing, they seemed to realize their own production limitations and wisely try worked around them without pushing it too far. 7 out of 10, escapes the "made for TV" curse and is overall worth viewing.

The disaster films of the 1990's excluding of course " Volcano" (1997 Tommy Lee Jones.) are just downright bad the special effects are horrible and the characters are pathetic. If you are going to make a disaster film you need to make them epic. If you are going to make a movie about an Eartthquake in new York then for god's sake show New York getting destroyed. The Earthquake sequence in this movie leaves you feeling jipped when it is all over with, and then it leaves you with pathetic characters that you don't care much about for the rest of the film. Another major problem with this film and most of the disaster films of the 90's is that there is absolutely no build up what so ever. If you watch the disaster films of the 1970's there was always a feeling for the first twenty minutes or so of those films that something really bad was going to happen, an impending doom that got you more involved in those films. That is certainly not the case nowadays and especially with " Earthquake In New York". If you want to see a good disaster film most definetly watch " The Towering Inferno" or " Earthquake" and if you are interested in a more updated disaster film catch " Volcano" with Tommy Lee Jones that movie truly delivers the goods.

AFTERSHOCK: EARTHQUAKE IN NEW YORK (1999) **1/2Starring: Tom Skerritt, Charles S. Dutton, Sharon Lawrence, Cicely Tyson, Fred Weller, Jennifer Garner, Lisa Nicole Carson, and Rachel Ticotin Director: Mikael Salomon Running time: Unknown Not Rated (equivalent to a PG-13, containing disaster violence)By Blake French:(The following may contains a few minor spoilers)If I were to say that by the end of "Aftershock: Earthquake in New York" every problem in the picture will be solved, you would have no idea of how literal I was being. The production has so many independent characters, complicated situations, and internal and external conflicts, by the halfway point of the movie, I lost track of whose who, and what's happening and where to what characters. Most of the time it is a good thing to have a variety of characters, but "Aftershock: Earthquake in New York," pushes the audience over the edge."Aftershock: Earthquake in New York" details an earthquake that erupts in the big apple and the mayhem is causes for separate groups of devastated people. Actually, this production would be more reasonably called "Aftermath: The Horrors of an Earthquake When it Erupts in a Big City" because it is more about the situations encountered after the quake than the existent tremor itself. During the earthquake, we see museums break apart, skyscrapers collapse, streets crumble, a subway train wreak, a bathroom disassemble, and even get to see Lady Liberty fall flat on her face. All the special effects are well done and convincing. The movie does make us believe there is an earthquake is occurring.The film wastes time during the first fifty minutes, sparring us the usual momentum build-up and developing the characters individually, so that we can to care about them when the disaster hits. Good attempt by the filmmakers. But their failure has already been decided. There are just to many characters and complex sub-plots to weave this unorganized, fragmented movie together. We meet Emily Lincoln (Cicely Tyson), a religious woman on her death bed while trying to teach a young, rebellious teenage boy lessons of life, Thomas Ahearn (Tom Skerritt), a family man having tiffs with the city mayor, Lincoln (Charles Dutton), who also has a family in danger. Then we are introduced to a defense attorney Evie Lincoln, (Lisa Nicole Carson), and her client charged with cold blooded murder. They get into a subway wreak (in a tunnel where the lights are still strongly working after a massive earthquake and countless other complications have occurred). A foreign cab driver named Nicholai Karvovsky (Fred Weller) is also involved with a young woman, I forget who and why. Also covered in "Aftershock: Earthquake in New York" are marital problems, legal issues, family crisis, financial necessities, political outbursts, and even medical disasters, all which are related to each other, but distract us from the main events the story centers on.There are a few unconventional surprises contained in the story line, but for the most part, this is one long journey in circles. After the earthquake hits, we expect the movie to build up tension for an aftershock, thus the title "Aftershock." But we just don't get that at all here, but receive a rehearse in an event that took place just an hour earlier. It is like rewinding a video and watching the same scene twice. The actual disaster itself couldn't help but recycling elements from past motion pictures such as "Volcano," "Asteroid," and "Daylight."The picture is directed by Mikael Salomon, whose previous work includes the also mediocre "Hard Rain" (1998) and " A Far Off Place" (1993). Analyzing his past movies, I think Salomon has a tendency to cover a lot of material on screen, but the material doesn't have much of an impact on an audience. In "Aftershock: Earthquake in New York" just about everything happens except someone answering the question of why there would be a major tremor in the big apple in the first place.