Review Movie: 2012

In 2009, (crikey that's now) scientist Adrian Helmsley (a pious Chiwetel Ejiofor) discovers the earth's band is heating up acknowledgment to contempo solar blaze action and the end of the apple is nearing.

So back he goes to the President of the US of A (Danny Glover) to broadcast the information, affairs activate for the end of the world. However, what the affairs don't necessarily acquiesce for is the abounding calibration adaptation of the animal race.

Throw into this mix, John Cusack's Jackson Curtis, conflicting from his wife Kate (Amanda Peet) and 2 kids (yes the uber-moppets, forth with a step-father are actuality and accessible for the apocalypse) who's consistently doubtable the final canicule are on their way.

Cast: John Cusack, Amanda Peet, Woody Harrelson, Oliver Platt, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Thandie Newton.

Director: Roland Emmerich

Well, we're pretty much screwed.

That's if you believe the Mayans and the latest release 2012.

According to the ancient prophecies, when the planets perfectly align on 21st December 2012, the world will end.

On a camping trip with his kids in Yellowstone, Jackson finds crazy old Charlie Frost (a wild performance from Woody Harrelson) knows about the conspiracy behind the end of days - and more importantly, how to get through it.

So, when the earthquakes increase in intensity, the nuclear family does what it has to to survive as Jackson does his best to save the day.

But when nature's worst is unleashed, the human race may not make it....

What can you say about 2012, the latest disaster film from the man who blew up the White House when the aliens attacked in Independence Day?

Check your brains at the door and you'll pretty much enjoy it - there are all the pre-requisites of any disaster films; terribly cliched one liners, check; major landmarks being destroyed, check; family under peril - from both nature and the new love, check; evil Government conspiracies and nasty Russians who get last minute redemption, check; massive explosions, check; lots of improbable escapes; check; bloated running time, check- they're all here for you to enjoy over some 150 minutes.

And yet, during some moments in 2012, there are some deeper moments which elevate it from the usual disaster, USA promoting pap. There's an apparent dark conspiracy (though the Princess Diana reference is appallingly misjudged) which runs through and there are moral questions about whether those in power have the right to make all the decisions to prolong the species rather than save all; unfortunately though, those are slightly over-milked by the repetitive sanctimonious speeches made by Eijofor's character. There are moments which will irritate some - the saccharine goodbyes that some family members get to make on phones, the depiction of the Queen with her corgis....

John Cusack emerges with his credibility in tact at the end of this - it's all fairly predictable stuff; but once again with his continuing charisma and old school cool, he makes it through - even though everything's falling apart around him.

If you fancy seeing a film with the world going to hell in a handcart, then 2012 is the perfect getaway - the effects are par for the course and not too bad in places.

However, I do have one plea - I know it's a symbol for Americans, but can Roland Emmerich please just deal with his issues over the White House and stop blowing it up now?

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People who appearance screenwriting as an art and don't decidedly affliction about admirers acknowledgment to their films barb at the anticipation of cine classes, in which Plot Element A and Plot Element B can be put calm in such a way that-- voila!-- a hit is born. But Roland Emmerich has taken that actual affectionate of blueprint autograph and fabricated a actual authority out of it, abiding every few years to abort some bend of the apple and ad-lib a scattering of ardent heroes, ball sidekicks and austere old men to survive his newest booty on the apocalypse.
With 2012, as you probably could have guessed from the poster art of tidal waves crashing over the Himalayas, Emmerich is letting go of whatever restraint he might have had before. Clocking in at nearly three hours, boasting about a dozen major characters and at least half a dozen emotional death scenes, 2012 operates on the assumption that, if we liked seeing New York destroyed in The Day After Tomorrow and Washington D.C. zapped in Independence Day, we'll really love witnessing the wholesale destruction of the globe.

I hate to say it, but Emmerich is pretty much right. Far from conveying the horrors that might befall us should anything remotely so destructive happen, 2012 feels more like a soothing bath of Hollywood tropes and cliches, allowing us to witness Los Angeles slide into the ocean like Atlantis, but then warming us with a Woody Harrelson wisecrack and a rousing speech from Chiwetel Ejiofor. It's numbing, sure, especially when the first half is nothing but CGI explosion after another, but on some level it's exactly what we expect out of Hollywood-- shallow spectacle and a bevy of stars, an adventure and a few moral lessons, a giant budget spent guaranteeing we won't feel a bit different than we did when walking into the theater.

If there's any surprise at all in 2012, it's that Chiwetel Ejiofor, not John Cusack, is in fact the star of the film. We meet him in what amount to the film's prologue, a White House-employed geologist trying to prove to a cynical chief of staff (Oliver Platt, wonderfully hammy and villainous) that, in fact, the end is nigh. The cause is less important than the results-- giant fissures open up in the earth's surface, mountains turns to volcanos and skyscrapers turn to ash, and eventually tidal waves cover the entire earth's surface.

Billions of people die in the ensuing melee, but there are only a few we're instructed to care about. Chief among them is Cusack and his family, who start driving out of Los Angeles seconds before the destruction begins thanks to a tip from Woody Harrelson, who plays a Yellowstone-residing conspiracy theorist who saw the whole thing coming and made a YouTube video about it (Emmerich's nods toward modern concerns, like casting Danny Glover as the President and having characters constantly complain about cell service, head toward parody when Harrelson demands that Cusack "download my blog.") Plot mechanics too silly to describe require Cusack, his ex-wife (Amanda Peet), her new boyfriend (Tom McCarthy) and their cutesy kids (Liam James and Morgan Lily) to fly a series of planes on their way to China, where they intend to save their own skins in a manner that's best left discovered in the theater.

Somewhere forth the way George Segal perishes on a cruise ship, Danny Glover does the ballsy Presidential thing, a Russian absolutist and his bratty kids aggregation up with Cusack and company, and the capital players in Washington-- additional the President's attractive babe (Thandie Newton)-- all accomplish their way to a souped-up adaptation of Dick Cheney's bearding location. The final division of the film, while absolutely accidental to the adversity elements, is additionally the best section, assuredly abandoning all-encompassing and plasticine CGI for situations that feel absolute and dangerous. There's no villain here, unless you calculation the alone abhorrent Platt character, so it takes a lot of accomplishment to accumulate putting the characters in danger, and by the end of the movie, Emmerich has best absolutely run out ideas. But there's article about the calibration of it all, or maybe the way acutely accidental characters tie into the capital plot, that keeps the alternation chugging along. When Ejiofor gets to accomplish his hero speech, and assertive bad characters accomplish acceptable at the eleventh hour, it's not absolutely a "This is our Independence Day!" moment, but it does appear afterpiece than any of Emmerich's films back then. Somehow he's got a absolute affection assault central his movie, and no bulk of accompanist one-liners or clap explosions can booty that away.

Emmerich claims that 2012 is his final disaster movie, unless Independence Day 2 ever gets off the ground, and the movie is nothing if not an indulgent curtain call for the man who figured out how much we like watching cinematic portrayals of our own demise. It's all the reasons we've ever loved or hated his movies, but also a reminder of why it's high time to move on. When he ends the movie, no lie, on a bathroom, joke, it's not exactly going out on top, but those of us who love Emmerich despite him wouldn't have wanted it any other way.