I started watching this movie when SyFy broadcast it a few years back, but couldn't get past the scene where the guy's intestines literally fell out of his stomach (not terribly realistic, but still a bit upsetting). However, my curiosity got the better of me, and I did sit through the whole thing when it was on a few weeks back. And it did not fail to disappoint.<br /><br />The story line of this particular offering has to do with a scientist, Dr. Levering (Michael Ironside)who has come up with a plan for tapping into geothermal energy to heat Manhattan much more cheaply than conventional methods. He has contacted city employee Neil Kavanaugh (Kevin McNulty), and the two of them are planning on franchising their method and becoming filthy rich. Unfortunately, instead of tapping into geothermal energy, Levering actually taps into real magma, which starts cropping up all over Manhattan, and wreaking all kinds of havoc. When a crew of employees, lead by Matt (Costas Mandylor), encounters some very suspicious, and deadly, conditions in the tunnels and aqueducts under the city, Kavanaugh covers up the real cause. Geological services comes in to investigate, and one of the investigators turns out to be Matt's ex-wife, Susan (Alexandra Paul). She doesn't believe Matt when he says he saw lava in the tunnels. However, as more suspicious, and deadly, events happen, she reconsiders. By this point, however, overzealous Agent Walters (Matthew Benedict) has come to investigate, and is convinced that terrorism is afoot. Can Matt and Susan manage to stop the volcano before it obliterates most of New York City? <br /><br />Like most disaster plots, this one's full of holes. First off, our geothermal expert just didn't seem to really know anything about geothermal energy. Second, the implication for most of the deaths in the tunnel was that somehow the water in the pipes had turned into sulfuric acid, although they don't explicitly say so. However, it's hard to believe that the water would have changed to sulfuric acid without coming into contact with the magma, and if that had happened there would have been a huge steam explosion which would have obliterated most of Manhattan anyway. Then there was the homeowner who opened the door of his house only to be engulfed by lava. Why didn't he smell anything burning, or notice heat coming from the ground, and why would he open a door once he'd burned his hand on the handle? Dr. Levering is badly burned, and left unconscious when the volcano starts to erupt at the drilling site. How did he get out of there? And what exactly happened to him in the tunnels? Was he killed or merely knocked unconscious by the steam emitting from the bullet hole in the tunnel wall. And finally, throughout the movie, people are way to close to lava with no problems caused by the hear or the fumes. All in all, it's a pretty poorly written script.<br /><br />There were some surprisingly decent actors in this movie. Michael Ironside does a pretty good job as the mad scientist, who just gets crazier and crazier as the movie goes along. Mandylor and Paul do okay with the material they're given. Unfortunately, it's just poorly written, and there's only so much they can do with it. Sad to say, the rest of the cast is pretty forgettable.<br /><br />Is it too much to ask that the people who pen these movies actually learn something of the science that they're using for their plot devices? If this movie is any indication, I guess so.