After "Avalanche", "Meteor" and such other creatively titled TV-movies as "Fire!" and "Flood!" there were few places left to go except to dig into Hollywood's past and remake "The Hurricane." Thankfully, the cycle finally burnt out before such epics as "Landslide", "Hail" or "Mud Puddle" could be produced. Original director Roman Polanski became embroiled in his (still not completely resolved!) statutory rape case, causing him to withdraw from the troubled project, though Farrow stuck with it for reasons known only to her. She plays the single daughter of a strict naval Captain (Robards) who is in place in 1922 Samoa to uphold order. Once there, she catches the eye of a young man (Ka'ne) who is in line to be King of the local natives. When he tosses aside the bride who had been arranged for him in order to canoodle with Farrow, both his people and Robards (who nurses a barely concealed incestuous bent for his daughter) are up in arms. Meanwhile, young naval officer Bottoms, who has feelings for Farrow himself, and sneering Sergeant Keach, who delights in looking down on the locals, set their sites on Ka'ne as well. As the passions and tensions reach a high point, the title event descends on the area with little warning (or even surprise, it seems!) and decimates virtually everything and everyone. Farrow, though only 34, is far too old for her role. She tries to inject some degree of feeling into her part and is sometimes ably photographed by cinematographer Sven Nykvist (with whom she was having an affair during filming), but it's pretty hopeless. A lot of actresses look great wet, but scrawny, fine-haired Farrow is not one of them. Also, her ill-fitting, unflattering costumes succeed in making her look even more bird-like and gangly than she already is. This is strange since Theoni V. Aldredge succeeded in making her look stunning only a few years earlier in the same basic time period. Part of the problem must be attributed to her really bad hairstyling on his film. Robards is mostly one note and has a fairly ludicrous role to play. His final scene is particularly stupid. Ka'ne is actually not as bad as one might expect, though he needed a more intuitive director in order to give the role and the film its due. He was simply too green. At least he is very easy on the eyes at all times and seems to be giving his all to the part. Bottoms, who reportedly tangled with Farrow during filming, does all right and Keach is one note, though not ineffective. Other names among the cast include Howard as an alcoholic priest and Von Sydow (there no doubt at the request of his frequent director Troell) as a doctor. Every other cast member performs as if it is his or her first-and-only time in front of the camera and, for most of them, it was. None of the below the title actors seem to have any concept of how to move, look or speak like someone from 1922, a chief culprit being Rutgers as a local society matron. The scenery is lovely, the Nino Rota score is strong, but the story is hackneyed, the screenplay is disjointed, the editing is choppy and the direction is weak. In striving for convincing winds and waves, the makers forgot to a) allow the viewer to clearly see what is happening and b) make the viewer care about the people being tossed about and drowned. The finale is unrealistic to say the least with NOTHING in sight except a few bits of debris and the besieged lovers. Where did the massive ship drift off to? Where are the bodies of the many, many natives and others? This is the least of the film's problems, though. It's just a big, expensive misfire.