Cinema Sunday: Joe Vs. the Volcano

Welcome to another edition of Cinema Sunday, my weekly Sunday post when I look back at movies I’ve seen and liked.

This past week, we learned that national treasure and beloved nice guy Tom Hanks has tested positive for the coronavirus.

With Tom (along with his lovely wife Rita Wilson) at the forefront of our thoughts and prayers, I thought I would use this week’s Cinema Sunday to reflect on one of my favorite Tom Hanks movies.

Here’s a weird thing. I like Tom Hanks as a person and as an actor. But there are Tom Hanks movies I’ve never seen at all. To this day, I’ve never seen Forrest Gump. I’m pop culture savvy to know of some of the key beats from the movie (“life is like a box of chocolates” and so on) but I’ve never sat down to watch even part of that movie.

There are Tom Hanks movies that I have seen but not in order. By now  and in bits and pieces, I have seen Apollo 13, Cast Away and The Green Mile. But never at one time and from beginning to end.

I saw Tom’s heartbreaking reunion with Helen Hunt at the end of Cast Away before I saw his Fed Ex plane crash.

Today’s movie is not considered one of the better movies in the Tom Hanks canon but it is one that I did see in the theater at one time from beginning to end. And I for one enjoyed it. A lot. 

That movie is Joe Vs. the Volcano.

Joe Vs. the Volcano does not have what one might call a commercially mainstream sensibility. There is a certain quality of artifice over the proceedings.  Life looks like life but just a bit off kilter.

Tom Hanks is Joe Banks, a worker drone working in a windowless factory, a beige joyless environment with buzzing, flickering florescent lights. The only good thing for Joe is DeDe (Meg Ryan), a co-worker that Joe is smitten with but cannot find the words or the courage to say anything to her.

Always feeling sick, Banks sees several doctors who  find nothing wrong with him. Then he has an appointment with Dr. Ellison who finds something.

Joe has a brain cloud.

Wait! Joes has a what now?

A brain cloud, a rare condition marked by constant aches and bone crushing tiredness. It is a fatal condition. Joe is going to die in 5 to 6 months. 

Joe tells off his boss and quits his job. And he asks DeDe to go on a date.  The date goes well but hearing that Joe has a terminal condition, DeDe can’t cope with that information and she leaves.

(We’re not done with Meg Ryan yet.) 

Then Joe gets a visit from Samuel Graynamore.  Graynamore needs a mineral called  "bubaru" to manufacture  superconductors. There’s a Pacific island called Waponi Woo that’s just lousy with the stuff.

The resident Waponi tribe is open to a deal but they need a favor.  The island has a volcano and the tribe worships a god in the volcano and the god in the volcano demands a sacrifice every 100 years and payment is due.

And nobody in the tribe wants to jump in the volcano.

So the Waponi will let Graynamore mine his bubaru if he can get someone to jump in the volcano for them. 

Graynamore figures that since Joe is dying from a brain cloud, maybe he can help with that.

Joe will have access to anything he needs or wants as he makes his way across the country and then across the Pacific Ocean.

In return, at the end, Joe jumps into the volcano.

Joe figures why not and takes the deal. 

Joe spends a day and a night out on the town in New York City, getting life lessons from his chauffeur Marshall. (Ossie Davis is delightful in this role, the sort of thing that will later go to Morgan Freeman.) 

In preparation for his ocean voyage to Waponi Woo, Joe purchases four top-of-the-line, waterproof steamer trunks from a luggage salesman who really loves his job.

(The steamer trunks will come in handy later.)

Then Joe  flies to Los Angeles where he is met by one of Graynamore's daughters, Angelica, a socialite who calls herself a "flibbertigibbet".

(Hey, gang! Meg Ryan’s back!)

After that, Angelica takes Joe to her father's yacht. The captain of the yacht is her half-sister Patricia.

(It’s Meg Ryan….AGAIN!) 

From there, the ocean voyage to Waponi Woo begins. 

From here, you have to see the movie. Look, Abe Vigoda is on hand as the Waponi Chief and Nathan Lane is another Waponi. That alone should be worth trip through the rest of this movie. 

And speaking of trips, I will tell you that Joe and Patricia’s trip is not without incident. There are trials and tribulations and the four top-of-the-line, waterproof steamer trunks turn out to be ridiculously useful.

This movie is weird and not everybody got it when the movie came out.

One film reviewer wrote, "Not since Howard the Duck has there been a big-budget comedy with feet as flat as those of Joe Versus the Volcano. Many gifted people contributed to it, but there's no disbelieving the grim evidence on the screen." Some harsh stuff there with that “the grim evidence on the screen” stuff and oh, look. Using Howard the Duck as a baseline for how bad he thinks this movie is. (Like no one’s ever done that before, right?) 

I enjoyed this movie and like Roger Ebert, I found it to be "new and fresh and not shy of taking chances". 

Casting Meg Ryan in three different roles is a bit of a stunt but it works as Meg is wonderful in all three parts.

And Tom Hanks is just perfect as Joe, from the pale, tired worker to the bemused innocent who needs his chauffer to tell him how to live to the adventurer on the high seas, finally realizing how life works on the precipice of that life ending.

There is a scene in the movie where Tom Hanks shows the depth and the gravitas of the modern movie icon we know as “Tom Hanks”.  Lost in the middle of the ocean at night, Joe sees the moon rise over the horizon, it’s silver orb filling the sky. Tired and battered, Joe looks up into this glowing lunar magnificence and offers up a humble prayer: “Thank you for my life.”  It is an emotionally raw moment filled with power, giving a glimpse in the still young career of Tom Hanks of the talent that he would bring to more dramatic roles in his future career.

Joe Vs. the Volcano is an odd movie. But it’s funny and it’s moving and it deserves a better reputation as some kind of misfire in the Tom Hanks filmography.

Joe Vs. the Volcano is a good movie that I enjoyed.

 Get well soon, Tom and Rita. 

And everybody, remember to be good to one another.