Thrill
Thrill
| 20 May 1996 (USA)
Thrill Trailers

A disgruntled worker rigs a bomb, triggered by a motion sensor, on the roller coaster at a financially troubled amusement park.

Reviews
Karry Best movie of this year hands down!
ChikPapa Very disappointed :(
GurlyIamBeach Instant Favorite.
Mehdi Hoffman There's a more than satisfactory amount of boom-boom in the movie's trim running time.
Comeuppance Reviews Jack Colson (Sabato Jr.) is a hardworking guy with a precocious young daughter named Alice (Sternbaum). Luckily for Jack, his sister Teresa (Kramer) is the owner of a local amusement park. However, when there is an offer to buy the park, a mysterious evildoer (don't worry, no spoilers here) starts causing havoc there. At first it's just a few rides malfunctioning - seemingly by accident - but then the baddie graduates to a bomb on the rollercoaster. The rollercoaster is named Thrill, by the way. Inevitably, it's up to Jack to save the park, save his daughter, and even find time for love with the fortune teller, Ann (Harnos). Will saving the amusement park be the ultimate THRILL? Stand by for the thrilling conclusion...It's terror on the log floom as fan favorite Antonio Sabato Jr. snaps into action in this made-for-TV "thriller", originally aired on NBC. While the obvious play here for the filmmakers was to ape Speed (1994) - except make it a rollercoaster instead of a bus - and cross-pollinate that with Beverly Hills Cop III (1994), strangely, they really only opted for the former, and even then it's only the climax of the movie. No terrorists take over the park, and there are no amusement park goons for Sabato to fight. It's mainly just tourists wearing fanny packs and brightly-colored shirts walking around the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk. It's not really a "whodunit", because we very swiftly know who "dunnit" too early on. It's mainly about a Fred Dryer-less Stepfanie Kramer sorting out the park's financial matters while Sabato takes care of his daughter and forges a relationship with the fortune teller. Occasionally he intercedes to help people off a runaway floom, but Thrill really is a textbook study in lost potential. Really, think about all the ways Sabato could outsmart baddies and kill them in an amusement park. The possibilities are endless. Yet that's not the route they decided to go here. We realize it's a TV movie but they still could have done it that way. Part of the fact that the amusement park is a family business is that Jack lets his daughter - who is a classic young tot, as we call them - just walk around the park with the staff. That includes an older Black gentleman played by Bill Cobbs - not to be confused with another NBC star at the time Bill Cosby. Letting your daughter go off with him would be a colossally bad idea. But Norm (Cobbs) wears a bowtie and is harmless. Or is he? Regardless, he's a ride operator who uses what looks like an Apple IIGS to control the 'coaster. No wonder they're having problems.There's also a Star Tours-like ride where patrons get in a windowless van and rock around while viewing CD-ROM technology. No wonder they're having problems. Of course, it all comes to a head during a death-defying fight on the Thrill coaster between Jack Colson and the baddie. Did you think it would end some other way? For a TV movie that promises far more action than it delivers, Thrill is actually not that bad. Sabato and the daughter are likable, there is plenty of 90's fashion and tech on display, there's a rockin' intro with kids on skateboards aggro'ing it up around the park, and Sabato has a dream sequence involving the local mime. That right there might be worth investigation. Yes, we would have liked a more paramilitary-style Sabato crushing some heads in the tilt-a-whirl, but if we can't have that, Thrill - while actually far less than thrilling - delivers the next best thing.
Scott My vote of 10 is for the experience being an extra in a movie, id probably rate the movie a 3 or 4. I live right near Santa Cruz where filming took place and my parents, who happened to be in a Roller Coaster club (ACE, aceonline.org) were asked to shoot scenes on the coaster. I was only 12 at the time, so i had to do this supposed "school" while filming and i couldn't shoot the scenes on the coaster as there was not enough time. You see me standing in line 2 or 3 times (the continuity was actually OK) and you see my parents getting off the coaster. The best part didn't even happen to me, but one of the guys in our club, he got to be on the coaster as Mr. Sabato was jumping from one train to the next. I believe he filmed for a week or 2 and maybe a few thousand dollars. I filmed for 2 days and made like 500 bucks or somethin like that.I think you can see me when Mr. Sabato runs up to the station toward the end and it is revealed that the bombed is still alive. "Thats Impossible!" he says. I have a green shirt and long, bushy hair that curls around my neck in the vein of MacGyver.Yep, I'm famous.
astymegoesby Pretty good movie with Antonio Sabato Jr. (nuff said) - Acting is OK. Stephanie Kramer does her usual good job.. (I miss her in Hunter though) -- A nutjob threatens a roller coaster park and Antonio is off to the rescue. This is a made for TV movie for a good reason.. That's where it should stay. If you're an Antonio fan.. Here's a tip: Its on usually late at night on cable. Out of 5 stars, I give it 2 1/2. Get 1/2 bag of popcorn and some soda!
hejmicke Reading the plot outline may lead you to think that this is something like "Rollercoaster". That it ain´t. This makes even the 1977 Sensurround schlockbuster look like a masterpiece. The actors (mostly fair ones actually) wrestle with a inept if not inane script. Direction, story, photo, music, well everything really screams "low budget"! If the ultracheap MTV-stylewannabe opening sequence doesn´t make you reach for the zapper nothing will.There´s 90 minutes of my life I won´t get back!