Watch Nora Roberts' Blue Smoke For Free

Awesome Movie

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

Decent story with a couple of minor flaws. 1) I was thinking most of the time that Reena and John were forgetting someone. 2) Obviously Bo had his reasons, but the movie never sold me on why Reena shouldn't have totally spurned Bo for being a creepy stalker much less fall in love with him. I really would have like to see more time spent on Reena and Bo falling in love. On the positive side, there was good suspense while you wondered when the next fire was going to spring up and how were they going to catch the arsonist.Alicia Witt was at times great. She does a great job as the woman in love and you envy the boyfriend. She plays a really likable person most of the time. Her voice over at the beginning was good, but for a second I was thinking "this woman is the pyro here". But there were a couple of times her character was contradictory and I didn't think she sold it as to why. For one thing she goes from being the tough no-fear cop to being the little girl who can't do a thing. Maybe it almost makes sense, but I didn't buy her presentation of it. If her flashbacks are incapacitating her that much, I see at least two problems. 1) Others would notice it and intervene. 2) She never should have passed her initial fire test. Another time was in the hospital when Hugh dies. She spent almost no time grieving. And the scene chasing Joe with the gun looked ridiculous and if I saw a real cop chasing someone like that, I would be real worried about the gun going off randomly. Scott Bacula was steady as the parental mentor and friend.

The somewhat unconventionally beautiful Alicia Witt gives a good performance as an arson investigator who, with the help of her older partner (Scott Bakula), tries to track down a mysterious arsonist who seems to target any person she loves for extinction. I'm not familiar with Nora Roberts' books; Witt is the main reason I decided to check this film out, and she does seem to have put a lot of effort into her part. The film is professionally made and acted all around, with realistic depictions of fire (though there is one computerized explosion that looks very fake). The problem is that the story does not contain any major twists, and there are a couple of points where it cheats the viewer (without going into heavy spoilers, I'm referring particularly to the circumstances of Josh's death). It's an OK way to spend 90 minutes, but don't expect much more than that. (**)

If you like pictures about fire fighters and the police who deal with arson and what sparks people into enjoying the flame and causing many people to die. The story deals with a young girl,(Alica Witt) who witnesses a fire that burned down her family restaurant which made a deep impression on her mind and stayed with her into adulthood. It is because of this incident that she becomes a policewoman and has to take a final test which is going into a burning building in an allot period of time. This story will surprise you with plenty of sudden surprises right to the very end. This well written story by Nora Roberts will keep you glued to your TV screen and keep you guessing just who is the FIRE BUG! Enjoy

Best of the Bunch, so far. (referring to the 4 Nora Roberts' adaptations Lifetime television is showing January to February 2007).The chick got issues and I sat there wondering how the next person was going to die. All in all, that made for a good story. Even better, there was a great cast and a tightly crafted screenplay that moved along.Even in the face of a big character/story flaw, I was able to enjoy the film. I can't remember it from the book, but the literary device they used to show us what happened in the past was effective as a literary device, but it also created a situation that was more than just trauma, it was full-blown PTSD and I don't think that she should have be allowed to go into fires after her performance on the test. It not only puts her life in danger, but puts the lives of her colleagues and the people they save in danger. This fact, however, didn't distract me too much from enjoying the movie.I gotta say I was totally hooked by the guy who kept spotting her. He was cute and the entire thing was so romantic. I was hoping he wasn't going to die by fire or be a firebug himself. I love those tricks of fate.Now, that FBI agent, he seemed like something out of the ABC Soap General Hospital - a cop who's portrayed as a bad guy. Thankfully, it was one short scene and things moved along (proving it was definitely not an ABC Daytime product).Was it just me, or did the bad guy look like a bald Ben Affleck to anyone else? The rest, I really enjoyed. I'll be watching this film again. The only thing missing was something - a theme, an event, a person - that I could emotionally connect with. It was a good mystery. I give this film 8 out of 10 stars.