Firemen brothers Brian and Stephen McCaffrey battle each other over past slights while trying to stop an arsonist with a diabolical agenda from torching Chicago.
Nominated for 3 Oscars. 1 win & 11 nominations total
Top Critics Reviews
rotten:
Backdraft is sure to do for fire what The Poseidon Adventure did for water.
– Rita Kempley,
Washington Post,
1 Jan 2000
fresh:
The spectacular fire sequences, which must have been hellish to film, are powerfully enveloping on screen, thanks especially to the eerie effect of the title.
– Janet Maslin,
New York Times,
20 May 2003
rotten:
Visually speaking, the film does pretty well with fire-as-spectacle, less well with everything else (Howard tends to trot out fuzzy-toned Spielbergian backlighting on any pretext).
– Jonathan Rosenbaum,
Chicago Reader,
5 Feb 2008
rotten:
Visually, pic often is exhilarating, but it's shapeless and dragged down by corny, melodramatic characters and situations.
– Variety Staff,
Variety,
5 Feb 2008
fresh:
Backdraft has some of the raw filmmaking excitement that has been missing from Howard's recent work.