Genre : Documentary, History, Disaster
Distributed : BBC
Directed : Sam Miller
Produced : Alan Eyres, J. Gregory Smith
Written : Colin Heber-Percy, Michael Olmert, Lyall B. Watson
Starring : Rupert Penry-Jones, Olivia Williams, Kevin McMonagle
Cinematography : Giulio Biccari
Country : United Kingdom
Language : English
Original channel : BBC One
Release date : May 7, 2006
Running time : 90 minutes
Krakatoa: The Last Days (also titled Krakatoa: Volcano of Destruction in the U.S. on the Discovery Channel) is a BBC Television docudrama that premiered on May 7, 2006 on BBC One. The program is based upon a selection of four eyewitness accounts of the 1883 eruption of Krakatoa, an active stratovolcano between the islands of Sumatra and Java, present day Indonesia.
Synopsis
The 1883 eruption of Krakatoa is the second greatest volcanic eruption in recorded history (after Mount Tambora, only 68 years earlier), erupting more than 18 cubic kilometres of tephra in less than 48 hours, and killing about 36,500 people. A subplot concerning Rogier Verbeek (played by Kevin McMonagle), a Dutch geologist who had surveyed the area two years earlier and laid the basis for modern vulcanology with his research after the eruption, adds a scientific touch and a helpful map to the computer-generated imagery that convincingly portrays the ash cloud, collapse of the mountain, pyroclastic flows, and tsunamis. The film also portrays a family trying to escape the devastating volcano and a ship with more than 100 passengers trapped at sea when the eruption reaches its height.
