Top 20 Scariest Natural Disaster Movies

what's magma lava lava

here in L.A welcome to watch Mojo and

today we're counting down our picks for

the top 20 scariest natural disaster

movies

for this list we're looking at the most

thrilling and terrifying films that

involve natural catastrophes as Central

conflicts to their plot we're excluding

scenarios that are exclusively focused

on alien invasions or disease-related

and biological disasters we're also

leaving out the Towering Inferno which

is a disaster movie but not a natural

disaster movie did any of these films

traumatize you as a child let us know in

the comments below

number 20 Everest this film stands out

from the pack in that it's actually

based on true events this helps give it

a grounded sense of realism while also

thrilling audiences with Incredible

scenes of action and bravery

the story is based on the 1996 Mount

Everest disaster which resulted in the

deaths of eight climbers this is a very

well made film with hair raising stunts

gorgeous cinematography and immersive

production design it's the closest that

most of us will get to Everest and it

allows us to grasp its near unearthly

power from the safety of our couches

they've got a man to search as soon as

they can anyone who's going we're going

to leave a dawn where's that Dawn it's

great David go let him know what's going

on I'll be right behind you I'll come in

number 19. Aftershock this disaster film

goes a lot harder than most and it may

come at the detriment of some viewers

enjoyment Aftershock is about a major

earthquake that hits Chile and the nasty

civil unrest that follows I promise she

didn't suffer

[Music]

the violence is far more graphic than

what you typically see in disaster

flicks depicting realistic

dismemberments and acts of extreme

indecency that are shown in graphic

detail with the horror coming from the

characters rather than the Calamity

itself Aftershock serves as a unique

Twist on the genre but those wanting

more cinematic fun out of their disaster

films would do well to stay clear

[Music]

number 18 white squall did you know that

Ridley Scott directed a disaster film in

the 90s it didn't do so well at the box

office so we'd forgive you if you didn't

but it's well worth checking out it's

called white squall and it's about a

sailing ship that sinks in the middle of

the ocean

[Music]

while the story itself is mostly fiction

the story came from the sinking of the

albatross in 1961 which saw the deaths

of six people the survivors then rode in

small lifeboats back to Florida white

squall horrifyingly portrays the dangers

of the open ocean and how it can so

easily wash away our structures and

Ambitions the sinking scene is

particularly stressful and directed with

the typical assuredness of Ridley Scott

[Music]

number 17 crawl this movie combines two

blood curdling things hurricanes and

alligators the story concerns Haley

Keller and her father Dave both of whom

become trapped in a crawl space during a

ferocious hurricane

their situation is made even worse by

circling alligators who populate the

nearby Waters crawl is a wonderful

homage to be movie creature features but

it's also competently made with strong

Direction and good performances it's

much better than it has any right to be

and features lots of great monster-based

Spooks the violence is suitably bloody

the setting is eerily claustrophobic and

there are jump scares Galore

foreign

number 16 earthquake the 70s were big on

disaster flex and earthquake is one of

its standout examples well I failed to

meet city or state safety requirements

it's not a point I think we should go

beyond the codes you remember the Silmar

Quaker a lot of buildings that met the

cone collapsed this film was once the

Cornerstone of cinematic technology it

won a special achievement Academy Award

for visual effects and it was made with

an exclusive process called sense around

that delivered realistic and engrossing

sound design the visual and auditory

experiences combine to create a classic

of the genre the destruction of Los

Angeles is very cinematic and captured

with horrifying detail including many

graphic depths and moments of great

danger even to this day earthquake has

the power to shock and Amaze this used

to be a hell of a town

number 15 only the brave Joseph

kaczynski's movie did not perform well

grossing just 26 million dollars on a 38

million dollar budget it's a shame

because only the brave is a fantastic

Disaster Movie that beautifully honors a

real-life tragedy welcome firefighters

they take line they cut trees like

backbones to Corral the fire they try to

control it yeah

you fight fire or fire it's about the

Yarnell Hill fire an Arizona wildfire

that occurred in the summer of 2013. it

was fought by the Granite Mountain

HotShots of the Prescott fire department

and 19 of the 20 firefighters perished

in the Blaze the movie is richly

directed by Kaczynski offering up plenty

of mesmerizing practical effects that

capture the nightmarish reality of

wildfires like Everest it flawlessly

Blends realism with cinematic flourishes

depicting a true hell on Earth should

have been me

yeah he was better than me they were all

better than you number 14 The Impossible

the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake was a

cataclysmic disaster of unimaginable

proportions and it's captured in

startling fashion within the impossible

the film expertly balances the Humane

with the grand by focusing on one

family's experiences within the bigger

disaster

it does not hold back offering many

realistic scenes of intense destruction

the prolonged tsunami sequence is

absolutely brutal complete with

widespread Carnage and shocking images

of injury and death the aftermath is

equally upsetting with the story packing

incredible emotional power it examines

touching themes of family love and

endurance but it's told through the lens

of a modern catastrophe

Ah that's who I just saw outside

what color is my leg

number 13 volcano you can probably guess

what this classic of the genre is about

1943 Mexican Farmers see smoke coming

out of the middle of his cornfield a

week later there's a volcano a thousand

feet high okay there's no history of

anything until it happens and there is

starring Tommy Lee Jones volcano tells

of an eruption at the La Brea Tar Pits

and the resulting damage that it causes

to Los Angeles this movie trades

traditional disaster scares for a tense

and slow paced atmosphere as a huge lava

flow slowly approaches the downtown core

of the city of course there are also

many scenes of Calamity and death with

one shall we say melting being

particularly disturbing volcanoes are

traditional disaster fair but by

bringing the action to Modern La volcano

brings their apocalyptic dangers closer

to home

the tarpon's great assistant we now know

that A drugs are over hard to park that

means that it's traveling laterally

underground over the course of at least

eight miles number 12 The Perfect Storm

those who hate the open ocean would do

well to avoid The Perfect Storm it is

you could say a perfect storm of what

makes disaster movies work like the

impossible it Narrows a larger event to

focus on the specific experiences of a

single group

perfect

it's based on Sebastian younger's book

of the same name which details The

Perfect Storm of 1991 and the loss of a

fishing vessel called the Andrea Gale

the special effects remain eye-popping

and the hugely talented Ensemble sells

the horror of their situation with gusto

with startling scenes of ocean-based

horror and oblique ending The Perfect

Storm is an unforgettable viewing

experience

number 11. knowing while Alex prayus's

disaster flick does involve

extraterrestrial beings at the center of

the plot is an apocalyptic natural

disaster a solar flare that will destroy

all life on earth a 100 micro Tesla wave

of radiation that would destroy our

ozone layer

killing every living organism on the

planet the lead-up to this calamitous

event is full of portentous biblical

imagery from the whispering spirits to

the spaceships that represent Noah's Ark

the movie sets a tower tone and doesn't

really let up throughout its two-hour

run time offering up a modern day

parable about Humanity's vulnerability

it's a chilling exploration of just how

fragile life is on a cosmic scale I'm

not saying that 81 people are going to

die tomorrow okay I'm just trying to

understand why this is saying they will

okay all right I'll Grant you it's more

than spooky number 10 the core all right

I'll put this as simply as I can

everybody on Earth is dead in the year

sure it was silly all right downright

absurd the premise that the Earth's core

had suddenly stopped rotating made no

more sense than our heroes plan to Nuke

it back to life now with this horrific

breaking news we go live to San

Francisco where Leo Jax has the story

but in a way the improbability of their

mission just made it all the more

desperate most frightening however was

the isolating and claustrophobic nature

of their task as they drilled down deep

into the Earth far from friends family

and well human beings in general thank

goodness for unobtainium the material

used to build their vessel despite the

silliness there are some knuckle-biting

scenes when it all goes wrong that left

audiences sweating as much as the crew

it's okay it's okay

number nine Dante's Peak did anybody

feel that amid all the movies about

volcanic eruptions Dante's Peak has a

reputation for being relatively accurate

emphasis on relatively experts praised

the special effects and the portrayal of

the Geological Survey team but were less

impressed with how different volcanic

processes are all mixed in together in

Striking this balance though the movie

manages to build tension in a convincing

way before delivering a horrifying

eruption scene that puts other volcano

movies to shame

sure a lake probably couldn't transform

into an acid bath quite so quickly but

if you want to see what the apocalypse

would look like Dante's Peak has it all

number eight San Andreas

how bad did they get hit

not six

was it big loud and Preposterous

absolutely but the visual effects were

on point and the premise of a

devastating earthquake in California all

too real Brad Peyton's 2015 disaster

film San Andreas pit Mother Nature

against Los Angeles and the San

Francisco Bay area and although the rock

did his best to save the day it's pretty

clear who won while the science might

have been fudged the incredible CGI made

the movie frightening nonetheless the

moment the Earth ripples like a rug

being shaken is chilling enough but the

subsequent scenes of chaos and

destruction are positively terrifying

number 7 2012.

we cannot it's the disaster movie with

it all Roland emmerich's epic disaster

Bonanza played on popular paranoia

leading up to the year 2012. when

According to some the world was supposed

to end it's the Apocalypse in of days

the Judgment Day the end of the world my

friend after all the year marked the end

of a long cycle in the Mayan calendar

and therefore the sky is falling while

that didn't happen the movie 2012

certainly did its damnedest to frighten

the bejesus out of us the eruption of

Yellowstone in particular was terrifying

especially since it actually could blow

sometime in the future even if not for

the mumbo-jumbo reasons described

number six Deep Impact this comet is

larger than Mount Everest

it weighs 500 billion tons you're either

a deep impact or an Armageddon kind of

person for this list we're going with

Deep Impact as the scarier movie even

though Armageddon was a lot more fun get

off

the nuclear Warhead with a comet heading

for earth Robert Duvall's character

Captain Spurgeon fish Tanner leads a

last-ditch mission to save the planet

back on the ground there's an incredible

sense of helplessness as people prepare

for the worst the lottery system to

decide who survives is much too

plausible and that tsunami scene with

talioni and Maximilian shell waiting on

the beach still haunts our nightmares

number five The Poseidon Adventure

Poseidon Adventure was one of the most

ambitious movies of the 1970s and along

with the Towering Inferno and Airport

helped give rise to the disaster genre

it follows the sinking of a fictional

luxury liner and for a movie released in

1972 it still looks horrifyingly

spectacular thanks to its Academy

award-winning visual effects

in fact it wasn't until Titanic 25 years

later that a sinking ship was so

viscerally captured on film if you've

only seen the 2006 remake do yourself a

favor and watch the original and while

you're at it Purge the Remake from your

memory

then take me number four the day after

tomorrow oh oh my God

came and erased the Hollywood sign the

Hollywood sign is gone The Day After

Tomorrow is classic Roland Emerick loud

and utterly baffling yet absolutely

thrilling thanks to its spectacular

visual effects sometimes you just want

to see the world get destroyed and when

it comes to that The Day After Tomorrow

has no rival

this movie has it all from devastating

tornadoes and hail storms to a massive

tsunami that sweeps its way through the

streets of Manhattan the image of the

Statue of Liberty being swallowed by a

storm surge is Iconic stuff the movie is

basically a greatest hits collection of

all the best disaster scenarios and

they're all shown in breathtaking and

terrifying fashion

number three the birds

[Applause]

foreign

Alfred Hitchcock's the birds is a horror

Thriller with all the Hallmarks of a

great Disaster Movie too you've got your

ominous warning signs in the form of the

first attacks and birds flying into

windows and then come escalating scenes

of ever greater chaos and destruction

including a corpse with its eyes gouged

out a hysterical prophet of Doom and an

explosion at a gas station

famous Downer ending that signals the

possible end of the world as we know it

it's certainly a classic horror movie

but in some ways it's also a precursor

to the entire disaster genre don't they

ever stop migrating

number two the wave

this small budget Norwegian movie blew

away critics with special effects to

rival Hollywood Blockbusters inspired by

real natural disasters in Norway's

Northwestern fjords the wave follows a

geologist and his family as they try to

escape a 260 foot tall tsunami it's a

simple story and it borrows many

disaster cliches but its slow pace

allows audiences to broil in the tension

and grow attached to the characters

which makes the inevitable destruction

all the more compelling every disaster

buff needs to check out the wave just

don't watch the horrible English dub

it's completely hopeless yeah would you

rather be out there okay calm down you

know what you should watch though the

2018 sequel the quake

foreign

be sure to subscribe to our Channel and

ring the bell to get notified about our

latest videos you have the option to be

notified for occasional videos or all of

them if you're on your phone make sure

you go into your settings and switch on

notifications

number one Moon fall

don't know about you but nothing scares

us more than the moon detaching from its

Interstellar orbit and rapidly hurtling

towards Earth something obviously

happened to the one inside our moon

and that's why it's fair enough calls no

just kidding that's ridiculous even by

Disaster Movie standards number one

twister

there might be bigger louder more

apocalyptic disaster movies but there is

no Disaster Movie quite like twister

twister captured a nation in 1996 thanks

to its Relentless action and impressive

set pieces some of which have become

iconic Staples of the genre one only

need here the word twister to conjure up

images of a drive-in being destroyed a

cow being hurled through the air or a

farm being decimated by a massive cloud

of swirling black dust

let's go

it was enough to give kids nightmares

and to make adults fear the wrath of

tornadoes who knew scientific research

was so action-packed

what is that

did you enjoy this video check out these

other clips from WatchMojo and be sure

to subscribe and ring the bell to be

notified about our latest videos

foreign