To me, this movie is perfection.

Bad Acting and worse Bad Screenplay

The acting is good, and the firecracker script has some excellent ideas.

The movie's not perfect, but it sticks the landing of its message. It was engaging - thrilling at times - and I personally thought it was a great time.

Thank God I did not pay for this!!... what more can be said about this waste of celluloid. the people who give good reviews to this... has been seriously smoking too much marijuana. just like the one who wrote it.when you decide to turn off the TV because it is not worth continuing to waste electricity by watching it. that tells you everything.

I had a friend who laughed at anything, and thought all comedies were works of genius. This thing is no exception. The only problem is that it's slow paced, unfocused, and, like old cliché goes, "It looked great on paper."I'm sure the screenplay read as if it were an interesting project, but you really need to know what you're doing when you direct your own stuff, and one gets the impression that the writer didn't direct a whole lot of projects prior. And indeed said director has no track record of anything prior to this credit.There are talented people out there who can make things work the first time around. And there are people for whom much talent is given to them in the form of personnel in order that they do not fail. And then there are the people who've done lots of favors for everyone else, and so they cajole others to let them handle something.Where this film isn't a ludicrous bomb with B-movie overtones, far from it, it does lack a certain energy that was much needed and might have been injected by any other seasoned director. I guess in the end it's a time waster. I'm glad it's not a movie I paid to see (I caught it on HBO a year after it had been in the theatres), and where it isn't horrible, it's in a solid middle gray area of mediocre. Watch at your own risk.

I wasn't going to review this film because it's already been reviewed by well over 100 posters. But, I'm changing my mind because I think there's more to this film than is immediately apparent.Superficially it's just another comedy. And, that seeming superficiality is accentuated by the title -- "Joe Versus The Volcano"; it even sounds shallow.What sets this above the average comedy is that it's all about humor WITHIN RELATIONSHIPS. And not just permanent relationships, but how we relate to everyday people we may only come across by accident. We start off in a work setting this is devoid of human relationships -- Joe (Tom Hanks) works in an environment where his boss (Dan Hedaya) smothers any humanity, thus clamping down on any human interaction between Joe and DeDe (Meg Ryan). Then, Joe is diagnosed with a "brain cloud" by a doctor (Robert Stack). He is then approached by a businessman (Lloyd Bridges) who wants Joe to jump into a volcano as a human sacrifice so that the islanders will give Bridges the rights to a very rare mineral for his business. Joe meets the two daughters of Bridges (both also played by Meg Ryan), one who is weird and suicidal, the other of whom is lively and free.But what is key here is that Joe, when not under his "brain cloud" develops relationships with each of them. Each relationship is unique and begins to teach Joe than the world is not as sterile as his job led him to believe. He even develops a short, but meaningful relationship with a limousine driver (Ossie Davis).And while there is a thread of humor running throughout the story, it's not just a bunch of gags. It's mostly gags based on some aspect of sensitivity.What's interesting here is that this is Tom Hanks before we discovered what a fine dramatic actor he was...and yet, the hints are there is this film through a portrayal sensitively acted. Oddly enough, there's sort of a preview here -- Joe is adrift in the ocean at one point during the story; shades of "Cast Away" some 10 years later.There's also some funny casting here -- Abe Vigoda as the island chief and Nathan Lane as one of the islanders.As I've indicated, Tom Hanks is quite sensitive in this comedy film. Meg Ryan shows ads flair for humor, and is interesting because she plays 3 characters totally different in their personalities.Now, before you think I've praised this movie too much, I should tell you that once Joe gets to the island, things get a bit silly. Good silly, but still silly. But that's okay...it's a comedy.I maintain this film is more than meets the eye and underrated.

...and I've watched a few.There is so much going on in this movie and I am not sure that Hanks and Ryan understood exactly what they were a part of, but then that is also a message we can take from it - who really understands life?Other messages; we are all in danger of losing our soul; life is a crooked path; clothes maketh the man; once you are a grown up no-one feels good (implying that we should not allow that to happen); embrace your destiny no matter how bad it might lookAnd the above are just a small subset. Symbolism is rife, the sets are a clever mixture of real and surreal, the script is tight, the storyline flies along, and the entire event is a sparkling jewel. Of course you might not agree with any of this, its not in IMDb's top 500, but it takes someone special to jump into a volcano.