The Fire Next Time (1993)

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This ecological drama, set in 2017, presents a world where pollution has generated ever more unpredictable weather and rendered large chunks of the planet into disaster zones. After a hurricane destroys everything they've built for themselves, Louisiana shrimp fisherman Drew Morgan (Craig T. Nelson)… More This ecological drama, set in 2017, presents a world where pollution has generated ever more unpredictable weather and rendered large chunks of the planet into disaster zones. After a hurricane destroys everything they've built for themselves, Louisiana shrimp fisherman Drew Morgan (Craig T. Nelson) and his family, including wife Suzanne (Bonnie Bedelia), flee through a series of refugee camps to upstate New York, where Drew's estranged former business partner Larry Richter (Jurgen Prochnow) -- who has designs on Suzanne -- lives in comfort and affluence. Along the way, Drew loses his daughter, Linnie (Ashley Jones), to an agrarian doomsday cult; watches his elderly father (Richard Farnsworth) suffer a stroke; and almost drives away his confused oldest son, Paul (Justin Whalin). When Larry offers to shelter Drew's family if Drew himself will leave, Suzanne and the kids rally behind him. Things go awry, however, when an attempt to smuggle themselves across the border ends with Craig washed up on Canadian shores and the rest of the family stranded and penniless back in America. Originally presented as a two-part miniseries, The Fire Next Time premiered on CBS on April 18 and 20, 1993. The movie has no connection to the James Baldwin book of the same name. ~ Brian J. Dillard, Rovi