Movie Review: 2012
MOVIE RATING: 2/5
WATCH OUT FOR POSSIBLE SPOILERS!
I am talking about Roland Emmerich’s 2012 not the other torrent downloadable Doomsday.
Before watching the movie (even before having my ticket reserved), I predicted that 2012 is going to have really really good visual effects. That these effects are going to rock the movie house or scare the hell out of people in Imax. I was curious on the movie’s take on the end of our world.
2012 is starred by John Cusack (1408, Serendipity) who plays Jackson Curtis, an underrated novelist. However, the movie does not start with him. It starts with India. In the movie India plays a very important role: it is where the studies about geology are being held (believe it or not).
China plays a vital role in the movie. For the very first time I felt proud that the country was given such important role (I’m proud to be Chinese!) of supplying the manpower for a very big project.
And so where do these lead? To Jackson. Jackson is a divorced and messed up writer who discovers the instability of a certain place in America, leading him to discover that the world is going to end in a matter of days.
A bit later in the movie we can see massive earthquakes, lava, people being killed like ants, and the White House.
So what made Jackson special? He is lucky. There is a part in the movie wherein he (with his ex-wife, two children and ex-wife’s husband) is being chased by collapsing land (he’s driving a limo – then an RV) but he is able to dodge his car. If I were playing a video game, I would have ended falling in big cracks or flying my car. Jackson is a lucky man.
Here’s the narrative part of the story:
(SELECT THE TEXT BELOW FOR POSSIBLE SPOILERS)
Jackson saves his family by all means possible.
The US government chooses only a few people to save based on their genetic potentials.
The President of the US chooses to stay in the White House to die.
Chosen people are taken to the Chinese big project – a set of massive ships that can resist tidal waves and stuff. I say Noah’s Ark.
Injustice happens.
A little dog does not die; her person-mom does, as well as billions of people. This little dog takes up more than a minute of the movie. People are just wiped out by tsunamis.
Chinese men, along with the ex-wife’s husband get crushed in the ship’s gate. Jackson saves his family and gets back to his ex-wife.
The world is wiped out. Some people are saved.
The ship where the actors are almost get crushed.
The sun shines.
Mankind starts a new life in a now giant continent otherwise known as Africa.
Happy ending.
So where do the Mayans go? They take about two minutes of the movie, in a silly animation a crazy guy made. I would have appreciated it if the movie gave more importance to these people, who, by the way, were the ones who studied and said that the world is going to end sometime in December 2012; and who, by the way, could make the movie all the more believable.
My expectation of experiencing great effects was met. However, I did not come to the movie house to just experience the effects. I came there to watch a movie. Okay, the story sucks. It’s nothing unusual (except that China is given an emphasis and India is… nevermind.)
I came out of the movie house partially enraged. I was not moved at all. At least 2012 is a lot more not-bad compared to The Day the Earth Stood Still, and the biggest joke movie I have seen in 2009 so far, Know1ng. Still, it is a bad movie.
The Day After Tomorrow has a happy ending, too.
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