While Sept. 11 helped embellish the already heroic image of firefighters, "Ladder 49" doesn't owe any direct debt to such recent events. It plays, rather, like an old-fashioned, by-the-numbers drama ...

After watching “Ladder 49,” you will never complain about moving to the side of the road to make room for a fire truck. The new movie is the most polished of recruiting films. But that doesn’t mean it ...

In the film, Joaquin stars as Jack Morrison, a fireman who begins to reassess the physical toll and low pay his high-risk job requires due to his wife and kids. Despite the encouragement of his mentor ...

"Ladder 49," which will shoot two scenes at the old downtown Anne Arundel Medical Center complex on Friday and Monday, stars John Travolta and Joaquin Phoenix. Source Courtesy of HomeTownAnnapolis.com ...

THERE ARE real firefighters in the world who regularly perform heroic deeds. That is an inarguable fact, and it should not be confused with discussion of "Ladder 49," a movie that attempts to convey ...

Firefighting would seem to be a naturally cinematic subject. Indeed, one of the earliest narrative films was Edwin S. Porter’s six-minute documentary, “The Life of an American Fireman” (1903).

The attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 brought firefighters a long-overdue surge in appreciation and acknowledgement. As heroes of the moment, firefighters (and, to a lesser extent, Dalmatians) basked in the ...

One of the most enduring images in the weeks and months after Sept. 11, 2001, centered on the cleanup at the wreckage of the World Trade Center towers at Ground Zero. As the tons of debris were ...

When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works. It’s hard to make a bad firefighter movie. Unlike most action films, you don’t have to worry ...

It's loud. It's noisy. It's downright cacophonous. That being the case, I'm led to wonder if turning up the volume is a director's ploy to draw an audience's attention away from corny melodrama. Is ...