"The world as we know it will soon come to an end." When you hear those words in a movie, you know that you are not watching it for its artistic merit. As with every disaster film by Roland Emmerich, director of "Independence Day," "Godzilla," and "The Day After Tomorrow," his newest release "2012" fits into the classic formula of a popcorn disaster movie: cheesy character development + CGI + unbelievable plot = hundreds of millions in the box office.
But this time around Emmerich once again goes back to "The Day After Tomorrow" days in which Mother Nature isn't something to be messed around with. Solar flares from the sun have proved to be a little too hot to handle, as radiation from the sun heats the earth's core to levels that cause the planet's crust to crumble and fall into the ever rising, tsunami-churning seas. So what's the solution to this grave problem? To use what anyone might to survive a great flood: melodramatic acting and characters.
The corniness begins with the actors, who all have their own unique storylines that connect with one another. But the actors don't try to go beyond their basic acting abilities, with the exception of Woody Harrelson, who is perfect as the crazy hippie conspiracy theorist Charlie .Jackson Curtis (played by an energetic John Cusack) is a struggling writer, trying to reconnect with his estranged wife (played by an overbearing Amanda Peet) who is now dating the goody-goody plastic surgeon Gordon (played by Tom McCarthy).
Meanwhile, geologist Dr. Adrian Helmsley (played by Chiwetel Ejiofor in a decent, yet melodramatic performance) discovers the tragic geological events that will end us all. But what a coincidence! He's a fan of Curtis' book! While trying to create character backstory with these interconnecting story lines, we just learn needless facts about these shells of people which take up an unnecessary chunk of the film's nearly three-hour running time. Who needs to know that Helmsley was a fat nerdy kid? Or that Curtis' daughter still wets the bed and needs Pull-Ups? Considering the film's running time, you'll probably need Pull-Ups too.
Like many disaster films, the CGI is the real star. But even the special effects don't deliver. The earthquake footage looks as if it came out of a SyFy movie and, with the characters' feigned acting, it looks even worse. But it is enjoyable to see notable landmarks, many of which are included in the film's trailer, get destroyed in creative ways. Between the melodramatic acting and CGI, another formula for the disaster movie is enacted in the film: unintentional laughs at often "tense" moments which make "2012" just a little more bearable to watch.
"We were warned" is the tagline of the film, referring to the ever-popular notion that the Mayans predicted the end of the world thousands of years ago. And just like the Mayans warned us, you were warned about the "disaster" factor of "2012."
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