Question: Why did Paul insist on taking the van rather than getting in the Humvees with everyone else? When Harry stops by the motel later to pick up ELF, we see that most if not all the equipment got left behind. We also see behind Paul a number of times whilst he's driving, and the van looks empty so it's not like it had all their gear in it.
Question: I'm asking this because I don't really know a lot about volcanoes but, at the beginning of the movie, Harry was in the middle of a volcano eruption with: rain; rocks falling etc. When the volcano in Dante's Peak erupted, it was different from before, meaning that there was no rain (but ash), rivers strong enough to break a dam, burning water, dead wildlife etc. Even at the end of the movie, the volcano still had one more eruption before it finally died down. My question is, are all volcano eruptions not the same or are they just unpredictable when they explode? It just seems kind of odd that Harry was experiencing different things in nature after the volcano exploded. I hope I explained this enough; I'm just curious is all.
Answer: Volcanoes can differ because of type of volcano, type of eruption, and region. The Pacific Northwest has a history of volcanoes that erupt not lava, but rock, gas, and ash. Other regions (like Hawaii and Central Africa) erupt primarily lava. Age of the volcano is also a factor.
Question: How come Graham was able to drive a car up to Ruth's house but couldn't for the life of him figure out how a telephone worked? When it was still ringing he said "Hello" thinking she'd answered.
Answer: He's young and he and his sister are alone. He's worried about his Grandma and she's not answering the phone. He's saying hello because he desperately wants her to answer so he knows she's OK. He feels helpless just letting the phone ring.
Question: Why is the rescue pilot helicopter such a selfish person? He complains about working over lunch, refuses to embark on a search-and-rescue mission without hiking his rates, and even extorts desperate townspeople trying to evacuate on his helicopter for all their money. Why was he such a greedy and insensitive egotist?
Answer: Because the character is written to be the stereotypical antagonist whose sole purpose is to create the obligatory plot conflict. This was such a silly, unrealistic, and all-around bad movie, that the two-dimensional villain guy fits right in. I live in Washington and remember when Mt. St. Helen's erupted. Dante's Peak, which was based on it, was nothing like the real-life event.
Question: Why exactly did Ruth jump out of the boat into the acid lake water later on in the movie? Was it to make it easier for the boat to get to the dock? If so, this doesn't make sense as they were still pretty close. Did she just make a bad decision and not think on it?
Answer: She was also very adamant that she did not want to leave her home, believing that the mountain would never hurt her. She eventually realised she was wrong. She also loved the home she and her late husband built, but it was destroyed. By sacrificing herself she got her wish to stay.
Question: How did Paul die? Was his body dissolved by lahar? And did this lahar contain any acidic substances from volcanic activity?
Answer: Paul got stuck on the bridge that was being washed away by the rampaging river after the dam broke. His van didn't have enough power to make the jump across the bridge like the Humvees did, as a result he got washed away and presumably drowned due to the force of the water.
Question: Who did Spiderlegs belong too? Paul told Terry to put the E.L.F back on before NASA finds out. But then Terry claims they paid $450,000 for it and Paul says "Harry's masterpiece is a piece of junk." Was it owned by NASA? Did NASA build it for them?
Answer: It is probably the same arrangement as the DANTE I and II robots that Spiderlegs was based on. The real robots were built and operated by Carnegie Mellon University for NASA, so NASA paid for them but they were used by CMU. Terry says that they (USGS) put $450,000 "into this beast" - he didn't say it was their money and he was probably referring to NASA's money which was why NASA had such a stake in the robot and would not be happy about a risky move like removing the ELF beacon.
Question: At the end of the movie when they are driving away from the dust cloud and he says don't look back, there is an image of a man in the smoke. Who was the image of?
Answer: I watched the clip on YouTube. If you're referring to when Brosnan looks in car's side mirror, there is an amorphous shape in the ash cloud that has only a vague humanoid form, but it's just a shape. If it looks like anything, it would be a sasquatch, but it's just the ash cloud. A human body would be far too small to be seen from the car's vantage point. It's like people seeing real forms in cumulus clouds on a sunny day.
Answer: Volcanic eruptions can range from ash eruption to hot gas eruption to lava eruption to explosive eruption. Movies tend to inaccurately lump all of these eruptions together.
Charles Austin Miller