Disillusioned with romance, Beth, an ambitious New Yorker, travels to Rome for her sister's wedding, where she plucks magic coins from a special fountain of love. The coins attract unwanted attention from an assortment of odd yet ardent suitors: a sausage merchant, a street magician, an artist, and a male model. But when the best man from the wedding, persistent reporter Nick, throws his hat in the ring, Beth wonders if his love is the real thing.
After Brad and Meg move to a detached house in need of major repairs after a fire and decades of neglect, they're happy that cheerful teenage son Tyler behaves normally, for puberty. Young daughter Gina's stories about sometimes evil 'fairies' are equally dismissed, but get worse. Self-appointed handyman warns Iver Hagen them for 'things worse than ghosts' and ever scarier things happen. Ma irrationally believes the house bad yet refuses long to have Gina examined by Dr. Werner, who has a patient Olive obsessed by similar trolls. By the time the pieces are fitted, it may be too late.
Volcanologist Harry Dalton comes to the sleepy town of Dante's Peak to investigate the recent rumblings of the dormant volcano the burg is named for. Before long, his worst fears are realized when a massive eruption hits, and immediately, Harry, the mayor and the townspeople find themselves fighting for their lives amid a catastrophic nightmare.