Unreal Movie Review: 2012

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I’d love to come out here and tell you that 2012 is a disaster film with a heart. That amidst the destruction and devastation, Roland Emmerich has finally realized his lifelong dream to recreate James Cameron’s disaster opus, Titanic. He’s tried destroying the earth with aliens (Independence Day), monsters (Godzilla) and global warming (The Day After Tomorrow), so why not ancient misinterpreted Mayan prophecies?

The theory behind the doomsday scenario of 2012 was created by Mayans when they said that a planetary alignment on December 21, 2012 would cause…something to happen, and the world would end. That brilliant scientific analysis has been studied for centuries, and what we have in the film is the typical amount of pseudoscience you’d expect from a movie like this.

The planetary alignment causes the sun to flare up, which heats up the earth’s core, which melts the crust, and shifts all the tectonic plates around, causing earthquakes, volcano eruptions and tidal waves worldwide.

Determined to survive this ordeal is John Cusack whose character name there’s no reason to recall. He hears about the Mayan prophecy courtesy of Woody Harrelson, a conspiracy theorist radio host who just so happens to be right, and he gathers up his family to try and escape the impending collapse of the world.

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“I thought you were supposed to be fighting zombies at the end of the world.”

The other lead role is filled by Chiwetel Ejiofor as Adrian, a scientist who analyzes data from all around the world to predict the coming disaster in a few years time. He catches the ear of the president (Danny Glover) who springs into action, and calls upon all the nations of the world (except South America and Africa) to pitch in to help with a solution.

What they come up with is boats. Yes, giant boats that will house as much of humankind as they can fit, and when the floodwaters recede, will be able to repopulate the earth and start all over again. And yes, if you can’t tell by now, you are watching a giant, multi-million dollar retelling of Noah’s Ark. In case you STILL couldn’t figure it out, the scene of them airlifting rhinos and giraffes onto the boats should clue you in.

So John Cusack hears about these magical boats from Woody Harrelson, and sets off to get his family into one. Problem is, you need to be pretty loaded as each ticket costs a billion euros, which considering there are only about 940 billionaires in the world right now (and that’s measuring in dollars) you would think there would be a lot of empty room.

But no, apparently in the next four years, a million people win the lottery and there’s no more room at the inn except for the super rich and the political elite. So Cusack must sneak his family onboard, as he is just a lowly limo driver.

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So THIS is where Amanda Peet went.

It’s his path to get to the ships that’s what you all came to see. His journey has him perpetually one second in front of death for practically the entire film, whether he’s running away from earthquakes in a limo, from volcanos in a camper, or tidal waves in a jet, he’s quite literally the luckiest man on the planet, as any stray crack, rock or wind gust would have him and his family telling St. Peter how they ALMOST made it out of the apocalypse alive.

Visually, this harrowing journey is nothing short of breathtaking. The amount of CGI that must have gone into the disaster parts of the movie is simply mind-blowing, and the only thing that would have made it better I daresay, is if it were in 3D.

However, practically all of the best disaster moments have been shown in the trailer already, and as you can guess, if the best parts of a movie can be fit into 5 minutes worth of trailers, the other two and a half hours are likely going to be not nearly as exciting.

It’s a theory similar to when I saw King Kong. Anytime there’s a monkey onscreen destroying shit, I give it two thumbs up. Anytime Jack Black and Adrian Brody are running their mouths, I couldn’t care less. Unfortunately, in what’s close to a three hour movie, only about a half hour of 2012 is awesome disaster footage while the rest is an attempt to create sympathy for the various bands of survivors, something that through no fault of their own, is just not possible.

Disaster movies will always be full of one-dimensional characters; it’s just your job to make them good ones. No one gave a shit about Will Smith and Jeff Goldblum’s motivations in Independence Day, they were just great characters, and they made the movie a blast without making their screen time an occurrence you would dread. This merry band of folks, like most of Emmerich’s other movies, leave no lasting impression whatsoever and you just want to get them off the screen so you can see more crap get blown up.

It’s not an unenjoyable experience, but the bloated runtime pushes you to the edge of your patience, and the lack of stuff getting destroyed for a solid two hours of the movie will make you fidget in your seat even more. You know why we came, just give us what we want, and save the drama for James Cameron.

2.5 out of 5 stars

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“I WAS NOT INFORMED I WOULD BE YELLING THIS MUCH!”

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10 Comments

  1. If it says “Paul Tassi” on the review so I know it’s gonna be a devastation. So 2.5 is actually more then I had expected. I guess I would give the movie a shot if I would like the actors at least, but meh. Amanda Peet and John Cusack…ah, I remember now, they played in Identity together. Amanda Peet is the only woman I can think of who flashed and still plays “big roles”. John Cusack, like say Nicolas Cage, is someone who sometimes does his job right, but I still avoid him if possible.

  2. I couldn’t disagree with you more on this review. First off, you disappointingly downplayed the roles of Chiwetel Ejiofor and Danny Glover, and neglected to even mention Thandie Newton. Each gave more to their role than could possibly be expected of them in a movie where the only reason people are going is to see Woody Harrelson get destroyed by a chunk of Yellowstone. Those three were excellent, and somehow managed to offset the crappiness that now is John Cusack and my hatred for Oliver Platt.

    You also downplayed the disaster elements of the film. I have never seen a movie where a disaster is so sad. When you see Los Angeles being destroyed in ID4, you don’t care. You just go “Holy shit that was awesome”. In this movie… you saw people holding on for dear life as the skyscraper they were in was collapsing. You saw a fairly limited character (who had the best line in the movie “It’s Russian”) gain a conscious at the very last moment of his life to save his child’s life by using all of his might to throw him to safety. You saw old ladies smash into a wall of land… ok that wasn’t sad, it was hysterical. Even the Reese Whitherspoon lookalike managed to make you sad as she watched her love perish, or as she saved her dog (who you actually like more than her), or as she drowned looking up at the giraffes.

    that being said, there were faults. John Cusack continues his downward spiral in the world of acting. He’s now, in my mind, just barely above Eddie Murphy. As long as he refrains from playing 17 characters in a movie, he should be good in that respect. Him outrunning the disaster was ridiculous, to say the least. Or when his camper falls in and he hangs on for dear life… why is it that the land around him just stopped crumbling? It’s plot-holes like that which really annoyed me. Also, what are the odds that Chiwetel Ejiofor held one of the 248 (or something like that) copies of his books that were published? Astronomical, I would bet.

    The massive retelling of Noah’s Ark was really the only way they could go, here. Emmerich tried to keep it as realistic as possible. Yes, the disaster bits wouldn’t happen like that in all likelihood. But he didn’t go ahead and load the planet onto spaceships, which would have been a jumping of the shark worthy of George Lucas. They had to go with the ships.

    And really, the underlying theme of selfishness vs. humanity was terrific. I loved Chiwetel Ejiofor’s little battle with Oliver Platt.

    Personally, I would rate this as Emmerich’s best film, barely surpassing Independence Day. I’d give it between 3.5 and 4 stars, out of 5.

  3. @ Lagrange

    Hey, I like some movies. Just not recently. Though I fully expect that to change this weekend with New Moon!

    HAH

    @Josh

    I respect your disagreement, and agree with you that Ejiofor, Glover and Newton did a pretty good job, for what they were given.

    I loved the disaster elements, but there just weren’t enough of them. For every minute of people getting thrown into the earth’s core, there’s ten of John Cusack trying to get back together with his wife, which I couldn’t care less about.

    I didn’t mention this in the review, but I thought the way they killed the wife’s new husband was a huge fuck you to the character, who had proved himself worthy of redemption, only to be tossed away so Cusack could have his wife back in the end.

  4. @Madison: Ever seen Guy Ritchie’s RocknRolla? In a movie where Gerard Butler and Mark Strong are doing their thing (let’s get this out of the way… I love both of them, especially Mark Strong. Love Ritchie, too. Cannot wait for Sherlock Holmes next month), Thandie Newton managed to shine. She has this aristocratic aura around her and she knows how to use it in each and every one of her roles.

    Oliver Platt… he is just annoying. He over-acts almost he ever gets and seems prone to play the same role over and over, the “I’m doing the right thing but I’m doing it for selfish reasons” part. And… have you seen him as Porthos? Holy crap was that bad.

    @Paul: I can agree that there was a lot of Cusack shit (I mentioned my disgust with him in my previous post), but I think you are severely underestimating how much disaster there was. Yes, there were a few scenes that weren’t disaster filled, but they were few and far in between. You can’t have an entire film dedicated to just showing the destruction of something. If you do that… you sink to the level of Michael Bay. The character development was needed. The white Jazz singer coming to terms that his son married a Japanese women and actually hearing his grand-daughter for the first time right before they died… that was powerful. The fact that they put such a strong theme (don’t alienate those you love because of choices they make) into a movie that people just wanted to see the world get destroyed in was gutsy, and they made it worked. With a minor, three scene character at that.

    I agree with you, entirely, about Gordon. He went from this wuss who wanted his wife/girlfriend (were they married?) to let him give her a boob job to a strong, confident, caring man in the end. I can see why they wanted to kill him off; you have to have the main character end up with the girl. It’s cliche, but it’s a standard. But they could have given him a most respectable death. The most moving death in the entire film was when Sasha died by allowing everyone else to escape the plane before it went over the cliff. If they could have given Gordon a death like that, a death where he sacrificed himself for the people he loved, I could have gotten behind it. But… just letting him fall into those gears? That was an insult to him.

  5. @ Josh

    Hmmm…I thought Tandie Newton was atrocious in Chronciles of Riddick and even worse in MI2. She’s left a bad taste in my mouth.

    I like Platt in comedies and in Flatliners. Oh, and Lake Placid, which is a dark comedy. I dunno, he seems harmless enough.

    Maybe I should check out Rock N Rolla.

  6. @Madison: I didn’t mind her too much in Riddick. She wasn’t great, sure, but her role was minuscule so it didn’t really matter that much. And, besides, I got to see a man get killed with a teacup. A freaking teacup. That’s more than enough to take my mind away from a very minor character.

    M:I2… yeah, let’s be honest here, I like to pretend that movie never happened.

  7. Ugh. I’m getting tired of this director’s movies about millions of people dying and cities getting destroyed, only as long as the A-list star reunites with their family.

  8. I actually enjoyed the movie, because its a movie. When did it no longer become possible to watch a movie just for the value of entertainment? Who cares about the real life actors and such; I honestly believe that the real star of this movie was the special effects. What a great movie for this.

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