Take cover: 27 of our favorite disaster movies

Don't want to miss a thing

From earthquakes to volcanoes to shipwrecks to viruses, there's no shortage of thrilling and chilling material for disaster movies. Perhaps that's why the genre has been a constant presence throughout cinema history, going all the way back to Hollywood's Golden Age, on through the disaster-movie craze of the 1970s and into the present day. Here are some of the most memorable works of disaster cinema (not to be confused with cinematic disasters).

San Francisco (1936)

You might not even realize San Francisco is a disaster picture for much of its running time, as Clark Gable's nightclub owner and Jack Holt's socialite spar for the affection of a singer (Jeanette MacDonald, who performs the famous title song). It's a standard-issue classic Hollywood plot, but the sequence depicting the tragic 1906 earthquake is a jolting burst of fast-cutting mayhem, lending it a chaotic power that transcends any outdated special effects. —Tyler Aquilina

In Old Chicago (1937)

In Old Chicago starts off as an innocuous film about one family's climb to social prominence in late 1800s Chicago. That is, until an ornery cow named Daisy kicks over a lantern and ignites a fire that quickly engulfs the Windy City. Panic ensues, the screaming masses head for the river and one man is trampled by a herd of stampeding cattle. What makes the film even more disturbing is it is a fictionalized account of the very real Great Chicago Fire of 1871. —Mark S. Luckie and Joshua Rich

The Rains Came (1939)

In the first few moments of the movie, Tom Ransome (George Brent) laments ''Oh how I wish the rains would come.'' And come they did. Rain splashes all over the Indian city of Ranchipur, knocking down entire buildings, causing the ground to collapse, and creating a flood that destroys everything in its path. The destruction and the resulting aftermath is the backdrop between a beautiful love story between Lady Edwina Esketh (Myrna Loy) and Major Rama Safti (Tyrone Power) — kind of like Titanic without the boat. —Mark S. Luckie and Joshua Rich

A Night to Remember (1958)

Long before James Cameron infused the Titanic tragedy with a grand, doomed romance, this British film was the definitive cinematic account of the sinking. Like Cameron's film, A Night to Remember was a huge financial undertaking (it was the most expensive film ever made in Britain at the time), but was not blessed with the Avatar filmmaker's box-office Midas touch. Still, A Night to Remember is widely considered the best depiction of the Titanic disaster on film, boasting stark realism, meticulous detail, and as affecting a depiction of the class disparity on board as the ballad of Jack and Rose. —Tyler Aquilina

• A Night to Remember 100 years after the sinking of the Titanic

Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea (1961)

The crew of the Seaview submarine are trapped underwater while a fire in the sky is rapidly heating the world around them and...wait, is that a giant octopus? The freakishly large cephalopod is only one of the many perils Robert Sterling, Walter Pidgeon, and the rest of the film's stars have to contend with in this feature predecessor to the popular TV show. —Mark S. Luckie and Joshua Rich

The Day the Earth Caught Fire (1961)

A classic apocalyptic thriller of the Cold War era, The Day the Earth Caught Fire posits a scenario in which the explosions from nuclear weapons testing have shifted the Earth off its axis. This triggers an environmental crisis, as the planet heats up, bodies of water evaporate, and the Earth's orbit begins to drift toward the Sun. Though its anxieties are very much rooted in the atomic age, the film has gained renewed relevance in our current (changing) climate: the devastating changes it depicts may not be so far-fetched. —Tyler Aquilina

Airport (1970)

Heck, if we weren't interested in mixing things up a bit, George Kennedy, the undisputed King of Disaster Movies, could easily fill out this whole list. Three decades ago, you couldn't come across an Earthquake or a Concorde: Airport '79 without tripping over the brawny brute who always survived through sheer guts. That all started with this Best Picture nominee, where his cigar-chompin' Joe Patroni throttles up those engines (''Hold on! We're goin' for broke!'') to clear a stuck jet from a snowbound runway — thereby saving squirrelly Oscar-winning stowaway Helen Hayes from a nasty crash and making it safe for captain Dean Martin and stewardess Jacqueline Bisset to have their baby after all. —Mark S. Luckie and Joshua Rich

The Poseidon Adventure (1972)

She may be a sweet granny with a little extra meat on her bones who's trapped in a capsized ocean liner, but, as talkative Shelley Winters will proudly tell you, ''In the water I'm a very skinny lady.'' Good thing, because when Gene Hackman gets pinned under a submerged slab of metal, it's up to ''the underwater swimming champ of New York for three years running'' to rescue him. By swallowing her pride (all those fat comments!) and a big gulp of air, Winters won an Oscar nomination for pulling off the best moment in the best disaster flick ever. —Mark S. Luckie and Joshua Rich

The Towering Inferno (1974)

Disaster master Irwin Allen's thrilling Best Picture nominee is overflowing with classic instances of historical import: Paul Newman and Jennifer Jones meet... Mike Lookinland (a.k.a., Bobby Brady)! William Holden wears a scarlet dinner jacket... and lives to tell about it! Tops is security guard O.J. Simpson putting his mark on the genre's obligatory animal rescue by saving a cat from a scorching skyscraper. (''Say, kitty,'' he coos, ''I almost missed ya.'') Watching the star cradle that sweet ball of fur is a timeless reminder that amidst the most hellish chaos and destruction, compassion and humanity still survive. Thank you, O.J. —Mark S. Luckie and Joshua Rich

Earthquake (1974)

There wasn't a boy in the 1970s who didn't get all giddy over this pleasing and plot-light demolition derby...presented in amazing Sensurround (yes, the theater seats really did vibrate — sort of)! Starring disaster stalwart Charlton Heston (The Naked Jungle, Airport 1975), the movie won an Oscar for the then-groundbreaking effects it displayed when a massive rumbler topples L.A. Of course, now that such realistic-looking flicks as 2012 have come along, what was once state-of-the-art looks like some dude was just shaking a table holding a scale model of Hollywood. —Mark S. Luckie and Joshua Rich

Airplane! (1980)

Way back in 1992, we anointed the comedic masterpiece Airplane! the funniest movie ever, and with good reason. The ZAZ boys (writer-directors Jerry Zucker, Jim Abrahams, and David Zucker) are to humor what Phil Spector is to music. There's so much going on in every frame of Airplane! — which, aside from being positively hilarious, is also a totally legitimate crashing-jetliner disaster flick — watching it feels like being pummeled by a Wall of Laughs. —Marc Bernardin

Outbreak (1995)

Outbreak's chillingly plausible setup — a monkey carrying a deadly, Ebola-like virus is smuggled into the U.S., spreading the virus to humans — puts it a cut above your standard pandemic movie. Dustin Hoffman stars as a U.S. Army colonel who must battle a military conspiracy in order to save a California town from the virus, with a packed supporting cast including Morgan Freeman, Donald Sutherland, and Rene Russo. —Tyler Aquilina

Twister (1996)

The tornado tale doesn't fit the traditional models established by Poseidon (a disaster's occurred and we've gotta escape!) or Airport (a disaster's about to occur and we've gotta prevent it!). But there's no denying the force of those would-be Fingers of God that terrorize the prairie, scooping up houses, tanker trucks, and, best of all, a mooing steer. Like Walter Matthau's cameo in Earthquake and Owen Wilson's wisecracks in Armageddon, flying cows are the kind of wonderfully out-of-place bits of levity we die for. —Mark S. Luckie and Joshua Rich

Independence Day (1996)

An all-star cast including Will Smith as a hunky fighter pilot, Bill Pullman as the troubled president, Jeff Goldblum as a nerdy environmentalist, Vivica A. Fox as a bootylicious ''dancer,'' and a kooky Randy Quaid all fight to survive after aliens obliterate major cities around the world. Independence Day occasionally strays into the megalo-melodramatic, and never more so than when a dog makes a slowmotion leap into a doorway just milliseconds before a wall of flames nearly engulfs him. —Mark S. Luckie and Joshua Rich

Titanic (1997)

The biggest movie of all time is a disaster flick? You bet! Remember: Without the stunning moment when the boat kisses that frozen hulk, this Best Picture winner is just another Romeo and Juliet knockoff. (And without its monumental love story, Titanic might as well be The Hindenburg.) That said, James Cameron's epic reaches the pinnacle of disaster-movie impudence with the distasteful suggestion that the most celebrated tragedy of the 20th century occurred because a few lookouts were distracted by Kate and Leo sucking face. (Okay, maybe that's just us.) —Mark S. Luckie and Joshua Rich

• 9 things we learned from Titanic: 20 Years Later With James Cameron

Deep Impact (1998)

Hitting theaters just two months before Armageddon, Deep Impact wound up grossing less, but is considered more scientifically accurate than Michael Bay's asteroid flick. While that really isn't saying much, at least Deep Impact sends a team of astronauts (led by Robert Duvall) rather than drillers to deal with the comet hurtling toward Earth, deflecting Ben Affleck's famous critique of Armageddon. It also provides a compelling on-the-ground perspective, with Téa Leoni and Elijah Wood as ordinary people grappling with the impending disaster. And Armageddon may have Aerosmith, but Deep Impact has Morgan Freeman as the president. How can you beat that? —Tyler Aquilina

Volcano (1997)

Everyone refuses to listen to geologist Amy Barnes (Anne Heche) when she theorizes that a volcanic flow is coursing underneath Los Angeles. It sounds crazy until the volcano erupts and starts flowing in the city streets and destroying everything its path. It's up to Heche and emergency official Mike Roark (Tommy Lee Jones) to team up and save the day. —Mark S. Luckie and Joshua Rich

Armageddon (1998)

It's hard to tell which is more of a disaster: a giant asteroid careening toward Earth or Ben Affleck's wild sobs of despair. Affleck and Bruce Willis were the stars of this Michael Bay concoction, but it's the antics of the supporting cast that make the movie memorable. Armageddon brought us such ''classic'' moments as Steve Buscemi playfully straddling a nuclear warhead and a doe-eyed Liv Tyler laying about in a field while Affleck sends an animal cracker stampede across her torso. And while Deep Impact, which was released two months earlier and starred Elijah Wood, also had a deadly comet, it didn't have Aerosmith's ''I Don't Want to Miss a Thing.'' So Armageddon wins. —Mark S. Luckie and Joshua Rich

The Day After Tomorrow (2004)

New York City has been the target of many a disaster movie, but few have offered a spectacle like the New York Public Library being inundated by a huge tidal wave. To add insult to injury, the entire city, as well as the northern part of the U.S., is turned into an arctic tundra by some gnarly post-global warming weather. The Roland Emmerich-directed film stars Dennis Quaid and Jake Gyllenhaal as father and son who fight to reunite with one another after the world has become a giant popsicle. If only we had listened to Al Gore... —Mark S. Luckie and Joshua Rich

The War of the Worlds (2005)

It's hard to imagine that when The War of the Worlds was first broadcast in radio form in 1938 it sent people panicking in the streets. Clearly they weren't ready for Tom Cruise and CGI. The 2005 film incarnation terrorized moviegoers with menacing aliens bent on destroying everything in their path, including one very cute and very scared Dakota Fanning. After all the destruction and chaos, the visitors are felled by common Earth germs. So in the event of an alien attack, huddle up with someone sick. —Mark S. Luckie and Joshua Rich

Cloverfield (2008)

Not a disaster movie, you say? The Statue of Liberty begs to disagree with you. Part of the 2000s found-footage wave, Cloverfield follows a monster attack in New York City documented by five young people with a camcorder, as the creature and the military lay waste to the metropolis. Cloverfield is perhaps better remembered for its mysterious viral marketing campaign than for the movie itself, with producer J.J. Abrams' trademark secrecy weaponized to build anticipation over several months. —Tyler Aquilina

• What is Cloverfield? A brief explanation

Contagion (2011)

Director Steven Soderbergh and writer Scott Z. Burns strove for supreme authenticity with Contagion, aspiring to create a movie that realistically depicted the outbreak of and response to a pandemic. The film follows the spread of a devastating virus from the perspective of both citizens and scientists, played by a staggeringly stacked cast, including Matt Damon, Gwyneth Paltrow, Marion Cotillard, and Jude Law. Setting the presence of so many exceptionally beautiful people aside, Contagion succeeded in its goal of realism, earning praise from disease experts as well as critics and audiences. —Tyler Aquilina

• EW caught a bug at Contagion

Melancholia (2011)

Impending doom, if Armageddon and Deep Impact count, so should it

Danish auteur (and provocateur) Lars von Trier turned in a very different sort of impending-planetary-doom movie with Melancholia, using the film's looming apocalyptic event (a rogue planet on a collision course with Earth) as an illustration of the protagonist's (Kirsten Dunst) deep depression. Also, the film only becomes a disaster movie in the second half, while continuing to function as an unnerving domestic drama and character study. Armageddonn,it ain't. —Tyler Aquilina

• Oscar ignores Melancholia: Why?

The Impossible (2012)

Maria and Henry Bennett (Naomi Watts and Ewan McGregor) and their three sons (including a pre-Spider-Man Tom Holland) are on a delightful vacation in Thailand when the 2004 tsunami strikes, separating the family. McGregor and Watts elevate the film with powerful performances (Watts' earned her an Oscar nom), and director J.A. Bayona (Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom) lends it a striking tension and visual flair, no doubt drawing on his experience directing horror: watch his brilliant shot selection in the scene when the wave hits. —Tyler Aquilina

Pompeii (2014)

Kit Harington plays a Celtic gladiator brought to the doomed Roman city to fight, where he falls into a romance with the governor's daughter (Emily Browning) before Mt. Vesuvius blows its top. Are you not entertained? (Wait…) Apparently not: Pompeii was roasted by critics, and on Saturday Night Live, Harington joked that the film "proved more of a disaster than the event it was based on." (Where does Game of Thrones' final season rank, we wonder?) But hey, what's a list of disaster movies without at least one disaster on celluloid? —Tyler Aquilina

San Andreas (2015)

San Andreas is there for moviegoers when one city-leveling earthquake just isn't enough. Director Brad Peyton's disaster flick offers no less than two massive quakes that decimate buildings and cause thousands of CGI citizens to perish in their wake. The film even throws in a massive San Francisco tsunami for good measure. And while he can't save everyone, San Andreas stars the one modern action star you might assume is capable of taking on the forces of nature — Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson. —Jonathon Dornbush

• Dwayne Johnson meets boy who saved drowning brother with help from San Andreas

Deepwater Horizon (2016)

Deepwater Horizon is the kind of old-fashioned, star-studded, true-life disaster thriller that Hollywood typically doesn't invest in anymore. Mark Wahlberg, Kurt Russell, and Gina Rodriguez headline the cast as crew members of the titular oil rig, but the jaw-dropping visual spectacle is as much of a star, leveraging blockbuster-caliber effects to depict the pipe bursts, fires, and blowouts that consumed the rig and killed 11 people while causing the worst oil spill in U.S. history. —Tyler Aquilina