2012 (2009/I)

Director: Roland Emmerich

Cast: John Cusack as Jackson Curtis, Amanda Peet as Kate Curtis, Chiwetel Ejiofor as Adrian Helmsley, Thandie Newton as Laura Wilson, Oliver Platt as Carl Anheuser, Thomas McCarthy as Gordon Silberman (as Tom McCarthy), Woody Harrelson as Charlie Frost, Danny Glover as President Thomas Wilson, Liam James as Noah Curtis, Morgan Lily as Lilly Curtis, Zlatko Buric as Yuri Karpov, Beatrice Rosen as Tamara, Alexandre Haussmann as Alec, Philippe Haussmann as Oleg, Johann Urb as Sasha

There is now a long, grand history of disaster films in Hollywood. The
best of the lot have combined suspense with cutting-edge effects to
keep your adrenaline pumping. The worst combine cheesy CGI with shallow
characters whose deaths won't affect you much.

Here's 2012, summed up: Look, some recognizable landmark! Kablam! Look,
a giant wave! Wooo! Do our intrepid Good Guys have enough time to
outrun the imploding planet and foil a plot to save only the pretty,
rich people? Probably! It's pretty clear what happened to bring us to
this point. Roland Emmerich, who's made such cinematic classics as
Independence Day, The Patriot, Godzilla, and The Day after Tomorrow,
was asked if he wanted a quintillion billion bazillion dollars to make
a movie about the end of the world, and he said sure. Then he took
parts of each movie's script, filmed them mostly with CGI, and pocketed
the rest. Viola! Greatest movie! (A quick break to sum up the plot.
Apparently, the sun and the planets have all aligned with the center of
the galaxy, which winds up causing the Earth's crust to break up, which
then causes the tectonic plates to shift. Mass hysteria! Dogs and cats,
living together! The End.) See, there are two ways Emmerich could have
gone with this movie. He could have given us characters to follow whom
we cared a little about, thus involving us in their plights, and mixed
in some convincing special effects. Or he could have said, "The heck
with the characters, give me blowy-uppy thingys." This sometimes works:
See Independence Day, a movie that made me feel pretty good when I left
the theater after seeing it but that ultimately, frankly, was pretty
bad.

Emmerich chose the latter. Which would have been fine, but the effects
themselves are wildly unrealistic and often take so long to set up that
you completely notice how godawful they really are. For example – and
if you've seen the trailer, this is in there – there's a scene in which
the Sistine Chapel falls, crushing thousands of spectators. Because the
toppling is so slow to complete, it becomes painfully obvious that it's
just a film running on a screen behind people running away. Sad and
unintentionally hilarious.

And you can forget about the plot, really, because most of it makes no
sense anyway and would happen only in a Big Movie like this. Of COURSE
John Cusack is divorced from his hot, bitchy wife (Amanda Peet) and of
COURSE she's hooking up with a plastic surgeon who of COURSE winds up
having had some flying lessons that of COURSE will save them all and of
COURSE Cusack's young son will somehow save the day as well and of
COURSE there is a Russian businessman who used to be a boxing legend
and of COURSE he punches someone out. And of COURSE people say "My
God!" a lot, because that's what people do in crappy disaster films.
And of COURSE the president is black, because in Hollywood black people
get to be president only if disaster is a-coming.

At least the acting isn't horrible. Because everyone just runs from
place to place in an effort to escape the horror, there aren't any
subtle, low-key scenes that would allow good actors to flourish. Cusack
is good in general, but what the heck is he doing in here? He's usually
so good at picking projects, and he chose this? Willingly? Oliver Platt
plays the kind of role that Bruce McGill typically gets, the hamhanded,
I'm-in-charge, Al-Haig-like politician. I can't even remember his
title. Danny Glover gets to be president and does get the best dialog
in the film, even if his role isn't a big one. Woody Harrelson, as a
crazed DJ deep in Yellowstone is also a lot of fun, although he's not
the kind of guy you'd want to sit next to on a transatlantic flight.

Final verdict: Yikes. Yikes, yikes, and yikes. If you dare watch this
travesty, you might find yourself laughing hysterically at things – and
this is important – that were not meant to be funny. If that's your
thing, this is your movie. I managed to see this as a matinée, so I'm
not out the $10-$15 that some people are right now, so at least I got
that going for me. Best advice: Watch it for free at home on a
big-screen TV to fully appreciate the magnitude of suck.