2012 (2009)

I have to wonder what this awful planet has done to writer-director Roland Emmerich to make him so hell-bent on annihilating it. In Independence Day, it was alien death-rays trained on the world’s most important monuments. The Day After Tomorrow brought us a man-made global climate change that plunged New York into Arctic temperatures. But in 2012, Emmerich really gets serious about apocalypse, turning the whole planet into a mass grave.

At least this time around, it wasn’t anything we did. As long predicted by the Mayan calendar, the world is fated to end on December 21, 2012 (12-21-12) and there isn’t a damn thing any of us can do about it. The Mayan set-up is quickly abandoned to provide a pseudo-scientific explanation for the impending doom. Geologist Adrian Helmsley (Chiwetel Ejiofor) discovers that the sun is giving off super-hot flares, causing neutrinos to act like microwaves on the earth’s core. When that happens, the gooey center cannot hold: plates will shift, volcanoes will erupt, earthquakes and tsunamis will ensue, and things (namely, the state of California) will fall apart. Adrian races from India to Washington, D.C., where he informs presidential advisor, Carl Anheuser (Oliver Platt) and ultimately the commander-in-chief himself (Danny Glover, still too old for this shit) that they’ve got about two years on the clock.

While stealthy plans are afoot to save the planet’s heads of state (but ostensibly only the ones in the U.N.’s good graces, sorry Ahmedinijad) and anyone well-connected and wealthy enough to afford it, the majority of the world is blissfully unaware that their days are numbered. Only the RV-dwelling, cardboard-sign-waving, conspiracy-blogging Charlie Frost (Woody Harrelson) seems to know what’s going on. It’s only by chance that divorced novelist Jackson Curtis (John Cusack) and his two young kids stumble upon the wild man on a camping trip to Yellowstone Park. Jackson also happens upon just enough evidence — a dried up, sizzling-hot lakebed where he used to go parking with his ex-wife (Amanda Peet) being guarded by about 100 soldiers — to believe that the long-haired nut is telling the truth. So when L.A. starts to literally crack up, Jackson knows to grab his family and find the secret place where the world governments have been building great ships to save a portion of humanity.

Everything else — no doubt, what the majority of audiences will go in search of — is predictable disaster movie fare. Impressive special effects depict high-rises collapsing amidst swirling clouds of dust. Fearful worshippers at the Vatican are buried under the rubble of a well-constructed model of St. Peter’s Basilica. Yellowstone’s dormant mega volcano, Caldera, sleeps no more, spewing realistic lava balls and ash as far as the White House’s Great Lawn.

All the while, the Curtis family — joined by a fat, wealthy Russian (Zlatko Buric) who’s managed to purchase safe passage aboard the modern-day Noah’s Ark for his clan — outrun the crumbling earth in a limo, an RV, a prop plane, and a hijacked Russian cargo jet. Of course, Jackson (a writer by trade, if you recall) drives well enough to jump a broken bridge and land safely out of the way of twelve car pile-ups. Naturally, plastic surgeon Gordon (who’s taken exactly two flying lessons) can maneuver aircraft through the kind of tricky mountain passes that would challenge even top guns.

It goes on and on like this. Seriously, at 2 hours and 38 minutes, 2012 is one bloated disaster film. Unlike its better predecessors, though, it fails to highlight the best of the humanity that you’re supposed to be rooting for. Sure, Emmerich and co-writer Harold Kloser give us the archetypes of characters who should tug on our heartstrings: the everyman, estranged from his kids, who learns to reconnect; the brilliant scientist with the heart of gold; the single father president and his doting daughter (Thandie Newton). But these characters did a much better job at inspiring Kleenex-grabbing waterworks when we saw them in Independence Day.

What would be the use of crying anyway? 2012 is not Deep Impact (the best of the genre in recent years). There’s no hope inspired by brave, self-sacrificing astronauts or a golden ticket to a safety cave. It’s clear at the outset of this film that billions will die and that any “solution” world leaders come up with will be in the interest of a select, privileged few. It’s also no Day After Tomorrow. There’s no enduring lesson to come away with about taking care of our planet and each other, lest we end up relying on the kindness of the very third-world nations to whom we’ve been unkind.

Harrelson is delightfully off the wall (and clearly loving every minute of it), Cusack works well with child actors, Platt proves he can play a slimy politician with the best of them, and Ejiofor does a fine job delivering noble soliloquies about humanity. Unfortunately, all these positives are doomed to fall on deaf (well, dead) ears.

In true Hollywood style, 2012 does tack on a happy ending to go with all the crash-banging action scenes and special effects, though it’s hard to determine if that makes things better or far worse. But once you’ve sat through loud, suspense-less, and mind-numbing, what harm could it possibly do?

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