Is that an overstatement? No. "Joe Versus the Volcano" consistently moves me in ways few movies ever have. It is a beautifully told story with a great message. This movie is so good that the two or three clunker jokes are easily forgiven. Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan are very good but it's Ossie Davis and Lloyd Bridges that steal the show acting-wise. They both deliver knock-out performances. "Joe Versus the Volcano" also has terrific music. One great song after another. This movie is great stuff all around. (I saw this movie when it first came at the Westbury, NY Drive In.)

Joe Bank (Tom Hanks) has a depressing job in the Advertising Dept of American Panascope in Long Island City, New York. They make rectal probes. He suffers under his supervisor Mr. Waturi (Dan Hedaya). He's diagnosed with terminal brain cloud with six months to live. He quits and asks out his co-worker DeDe (Meg Ryan). Wealthy businessman Samuel Graynamore (Lloyd Bridges) needs to placate locals on an island to mine a rare mineral. He hires Joe to jump into the volcano to appease their god. Joe hires limo driver Marshall (Ossie Davis) to help him spend the money. Samuel's flighty daughter Angelica (Meg Ryan) picks him up at the airport in L.A. Angelica's half-sister Patricia (Meg Ray) captains the yacht that brings him to the island.

I like his surrealistic work life. It reminds me of Brazil. The movie does get uneven at times. After getting the credit cards, Joe goes back into the real world. I expected more surrealism. After that, the surrealism returns with Meg Ryan playing another character. It makes shopping in Manhattan out of step.

The 3 Meg Ryan performances are a little jarring at first. I enjoy DeDe as a little wacky and a little darker than her usual fare. Angelica is not as enjoyable. She seems to be trying to hard with her voice. She should pull back a little with the crazy voice and she could replace Ossie Davis on his shopping trips. Patricia is classic Meg and shows their easy chemistry once again. Overall, this may be uneven at times but there are plenty of interesting imaginative concepts.

After the critical and financial success of MOONSTRUCK, its writer, John Patrick Shanley negotiated a deal in which he got to direct this movie. It's a glorious mess.

Once Tom Hanks was a brave fireman, but the stress got to him. Now he works as the advertising librarian of a medical supply company ("Home of the Anal Probe") on Staten Island, with Dan Hedaya as his boss. Hanks doesn't feel well. He spends all his money on doctors, until Dr. Robert stack tells him he has a "brain cloud", a rare disease with no symptoms that will kill him in three months. Joe is broke, so when Lloyd Nolan hires him to jump into a volcano on a Polynesian island, he says okay.

It's beautifully cast, with Meg Ryan in their first pairing. It also has Ossie Davis -- in an Armani tux! -- Abe Vigoda as a Polynesian chief, Barry McGovern as a rabid luggage salesman, Nathan Lane as Vigoda's side man, and in tiny cameos, Jim Hutton and Amanda Plummer.

The movie contains some great symbolism of a crooked road and Shanley's trademark big full moon, and there are references to bravery and losing one's soul that makes you think there's some deep meaning to all of it, but if there is, it gets lost in the nonsense and the great score. Hanks' performance is deliberately peculiar and passive, until the yacht he and Miss Ryan are on gets struck by a lightning bolt and sinks. Miss Ryan offers three sharply mannered performances as the women who interact with Hanks. I think Shanley was trying for a "Princess Bride" fable of a tale told to a small child. However, like that movie, there's so much funny nonsense going on, there's no real moral, just enormously entertaining bits.