Customer Reviews

2012 (Three-Disc Special Edition) [Blu-ray]

5 star:		(143)
4 star:		(110)
3 star:		(91)
2 star:		(78)
1 star:		(158)

 

 

So, when the world ends, it's the politicians and bureaucrats that we're gonna save, and the writers and the artists and the spiritual leaders are left behind to deal with the apocalypse. That was the most depressing element of the movie. What will the world look like if we only save the "important people" in Washington? Heaven help us. Seriously. If the future world is to be populated with the slimy-dog politicians and their ilk, I think I'll take my chances with eternal life, thank you very much.

Sitting in the darkened theater watching 2012, I was reminded of "The Bunker" at White Sulphur Springs (in West Virginia). Construction on the 110,000-square-foot bunker was started under Eisenhower's watch, when we were worried that the USSR might blow us up into lots of radioactive pieces. Turns out, our beloved elected officials were prepared to push The Red Button that'd end the world as we know it, and then turn-tail and run into their bunker, slam the blast-proof door behind them and emerge 90 days later when the danger had passed. And the most amazing part: The Bunker is outfitted with gee-whiz features that'd lead the unsuspecting public to believe the lawmakers were still comfortably ensconced in Washington, DC. In other words, The Bunker was *designed* to perpetrate a fraud on the American people.

Watching "2012" I thought about The Bunker and realized, this movie is probably right. If and when the world ends, it'll be the politically important that are given seats on the lifeboats. And it's probably right that if there is a cataclysmic event, the Powers That Be will not tell the unwashed masses what's going on, lest they try and steal one of those seats on the lifeboat.

That's just depressing on so many levels.

But I digress.

This movie is definitely impressive on the big screen, and the soundtrack has plenty of bass (which I like). But the script and the writing was a little sappy for my tastes. And as to believability - well - this movie fell short on that score, too. I don't want to spoil the plot, but NO ONE can drive a limousine *that* well. On the plus side, the graphics are truly amazing and scarier than anything I've ever seen before. I had to turn away from the screen to avoid some of the scary-as-hell images. It's a pretty intense flick, and it does a good job of drawing you in.

A nice side effect: After watching this movie, I'm a lot less worried about getting those pesky credit cards paid off. Does make you think a little more about enjoying every day, and appreciating the simple beauty in our world.

In conclusion, it's an interesting flick with awe-inspiring graphics, and it'll hold your attention - if you can suspend disbelief for a couple hours.

I think people judge these movies very unfairly. It surprises me when a movie like 2012 comes along and it's ripped apart before it's even released. "This movie's gonna blow, it's two and a half hours of things blowing up." I have to play back the sentence in my mind and figure out what was negative about that concept. These movies are meant to be fun, and usually nothing more than that.

I say "usually" because sometimes you get a movie that has absolutely no other reason to exist than to make things explode and momentarily lower your IQ (Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (Single-Disc Edition) is out now. Fun movie.) but occasionally you get something like 2012, which not only offers the calculated mayhem that fans of the action genre desire, but it also offers a surprisingly deep philosophical undertone. Go figure, right?

The movie opens with a fifteen minute montage that sets up the events that will eventually transpire on 2012, and gives us a look at the backroom dealings that occur in the wake of this disturbing discovery concerning the fate of humanity. Once that's over with, the movie picks up rather quickly, introducing us to the main character, Jackson Curtis, his more-than-dysfunctional family and a grab bag of supporting characters. After a botched camping trip, things kick off rather quickly.

What follows are two hours of absolute chaos. The CG in this movie is astounding, and I cannot stress this enough. The action is relentless, creative, and satisfying on the whole. The LA sequence alone will have you smiling, then you will realize you still have a lot more movie to go, and it never disappoints. The pacing is excellent in this regard. I was in awe the entire way through.

That's the bottom line: If you love action movies or a good old fashioned thrill ride, the disaster sequences alone are worth the price of admission (unless you're an astrophysicist, in which case you might be crossing your arms and groaning at this film all the way through).

But what I liked the most about this film was its underlying religious theme. People might be quick to pick up on the major references to this, such as (POSSIBLE SPOILER, though it's in the trailer): the crack forming between Adam and God on Michelangelo's "Creation of Adam" at the Sistine Chapel, the destruction of Christ the Redeemer, Vatican City, and the Buddhist temple. With these and other biblical references that you will miss if you blink, Emmerich seems to postulate a world in which you don't need God for miracles, and where everyone is back on even ground again.

Another theme that Emmerich sets up is the social borders that divide us more than we think. In a world that is coming to an end, it's not the strong who survive, only the smartest and the wealthiest. The film argues against utilitarianism on several fronts, going so far as to say that to embrace such a concept to an outrageous extent, even to save mankind, would result in a race of humans deprived of its humanity.

Now, I could be wrong. I'm not saying that my interpretation of the movie is spot on, but the movie did make me think, and that's what I found remarkable returning home from watching a film in which I thought I was just going to watch things blow up for two hours.

I walked in knowing that no one makes disaster movies better than Roland Emmerich, but I ended up watching something that entertained me immensely, made me think, and spurred on a very long conversation between my friends and I. THAT'S how a movie more than earns the price of admission.

Sir or madam, if you came for intelligent, thought-provoking sci-fi, please leave right now. If you know anything about Roland Emmerich, you know that he likes his CG... and lots of it, and usually at the expense of believability and good storytelling sense, even for the far out science fiction genre where audiences expect the usual. If instead, you came to see lots of glorious CG mayhem and stuff getting destroyed in spectacular fashion, you are in for a good time. 2012 is unabashedly dumb sci-fi and elevates the art of apocalyptic destruction to new heights. His over-the-top CG-driven films like Independence Day, The Day After Tomorrow, Godzilla have grossed hundreds of millions of dollars around the world, so why change a winning, if uninspired, formula, right? After the abysmal 10,000 B.C., Emmerich went back to doing what he does best: blowing famous places up. This time, he blows up the entire world. A master of subtlety he is not.

The story takes too long to ramp up, and for the first 35 minutes, I was waiting for the destruction to begin. Never mind the paper-thin premise of the Mayan prophecy. It's only mentioned in passing. We don't get any explanation of that besides a 60-second Flash animation made by Charlie Frost (Woody Harrelson), a survivalist, conspiracy nut and amateur radio personality. I didn't care about the predictable and cliche exposition about the discovery by scientists of Earth's impending doom and preposterous scientific explanation that follows. We've seen this already in Day After Tomorrow, The Core, or Deep Impact, and countless other disaster movies. The idea of solar flares heating up the Earth and dire predictions of destruction are similar to Knowing. You can sleep through the first 1/4 of the movie and not miss anything. It's all background exposition about characters we don't care about, including Jackson Curtis (John Cusack), a writer who works part-time as a chauffeur to a rich Russian businessman, Curtis's estranged wife and 2 kids, or her new plastic surgeon boyfriend, and other dysfunctional relationships between father and son, etc. Everyone is pretty much a throw-away character with throw-away performances by a seemingly laryngitis-afflicted Danny Glover as the unconvincing President, Thandie Newton as his daughter, etc, but you didn't come for the human drama.

In 2012, Emmerich is up to his old tired tricks again. Jackson Curtis is rapper 50 Cent's name backwards. In 10,000 BC, the protagonist is named D'Leh, which is "Held" backwards, German for "hero". He likes to re-use character stereotypes. We get a nutty disposable character, Charlie (a waste of Woody Harrelson's talents), who is the same kind of character as the homeless guy from Day After Tomorrow. We also have the same tireless scientist trying to convince world leaders. We get a dog running to its owner and leaping to safety at the last possible moment just like in Independence Day. One of the kids is named Noah, a corny reference to the later plot element. Lastly, we get a heavy-handed, trite, and preachy speech at the end about humanity and compassion like in Independence Day. It's all very kid-friendly PG-13 stuff and it's OK that the rest of the humanity gets completely annihilated as long as the main characters escape impossible odds by the skin of their teeth, right?

The story is safe, very average, and wholly predictable, but that's what makes it profitable. If you're going to see this, you are probably in it for the CG anyway and not for the quantum leaps of logic required to follow the story, and that's where I can find no fault. The CG is extravagant and you've never seen terrestrial destruction this fantastical before! With top-notch cinematography and set designs, 2012 really sets the bar very high for future apocalyptic films to come and takes us to new levels of ridiculosity. Entire continents get ripped up, whole cities go down in flames, an aircraft carrier demolishes the White House! And of course, our heroes flee in a Russian Antonov An-225, the largest fixed wing aircraft ever built (it was designed to transport the Russian space shuttle), because fuel economy and maneuverability is no big deal when escaping the end of the world, and of course, 10 people really do need all that leg room. And naturally, such a plane would be filled with Bentleys, Ferraris and other luxury cars that they don't jettison, because you never know when you might need them. Don't you know how hard it is to find voice-activated ignition and genuine all-leather interiors during the end times?

Remember to turn off your brain. Sit back and enjoy! Everything fall down, go BOOM.

Usually I have major problems with disaster movies because the characters and plot get lost in all the action packed special effects. Even most of the acting takes a backseat but with 2012 it's a little different. At times it can be very silly and over the top but to be honest this movie was so intense I didn't pay attention to the faults of this film. I just didn't care. 2012 honestly kept me on the edge of my seat most of the way through and let me tell you the special effects were mind blowing! Absolutely remarkable! It's worth watching just for the visuals alone, seriously. This is the real purpose of CGI. Everything nowadays is too much CGI and it's ruining films in my opinion because it's over-used in films that don't need it. For something like this that goes beyond anyone's imagination is just perfect and done correctly. Critics will find a lot of things wrong with this movie because it's not perfect, nor is any movie but this is just pure entertainment at its best. It's intense, sad, and quite sickening how selfish some people can be when the world has turned into complete chaos. Kick back and enjoy this jaw-dropping visual treat!

3.5 stars. I was highly entertained, but then again I was sipping on Lemoncello while watching. I agree with other reviewer that this film is a combination of every catastrope film that you have ever watched before. But truth be told, I sort of enjoyed all those that came before this as well. I like that the last suspenseful moments are from our heroes screwing up, but I really didn't like losing the step-father in all this and am not at all sure that our main hero, Jackson, deserved winning his family back. I think an ending of father and step-father accepting each other would have played better. I mean, did the wife even miss her husband? She just bounced back with the first husband like it wasn't nothing. My main problem is the selling of tickets for such a major amount. I mean, the currency won't mean anything in a world of no goverment. Seems like having each continent invest in thousands of Noah Arks would have boosted the economy for the three years that they knew of the approaching end of days and they could have save a whole lot more people. 3 three years and 50 states building arks. How is this a bad plan? Some assistant being listened to as head of state? There were a lot questionable decisions, but like I said with the right buss you will still find this great entertainment.

Before I begin my review, I must introduce myself as an optimist and a very emotional, sentimental person who usually prefers happy endings. I cry at episodes of cartoon shows, and I tend to become very emotionally invested in anything I watch or read. Despite this, I have a soft spot for disaster movies, the more over the top the better. I went into this movie already having enjoyed Independence Day and The Day After Tomorrow, but unsure how I would receive this. The trailer wowed me, but I was unsure if I could handle a film of this magnitude.

The title of my review ought to speak for itself: far too many come into this film expecting something that is obviously not part of the Roland Emmerich-disaster-film package deal. You ought to know by now that this is Hollywood: there will be contrived coincidences, bogus science and one-in-a-million-chance events happening every time they need to for the purpose of the story. I pity those who snookered themselves into expecting anything less, and do sincerely hope they find the perfectly realistic, even-tempered and dead-serious film about global apocalypse they seemed to have come looking for, even if it hasn't been made yet.

I'll begin with the story: It's an adequate vehicle to carry what we all came to see: the world as we know it coming to an end. As I said, I tend to be sentimental, so I teared up at parts, but most probably will not. The characters are, at least, an interesting array of players and most of the ones that we intimately get to know throughout the film will survive through to the end (I'm also not big on character death, so this was fortunate for me). In addition, Emmerich, fortunately, must have heard the legendary Alfred Hitchcock proclaim that even when you're writing drama and suspense, one must, while winding up the viewer tighter and tighter, let them a little loose with a joke otherwise you'll wind them too tight. Now, this is paraphrased, but my point is is that I appreciated the sporadic, but generally well-placed use of the occasional one-liner to let a little tension out. The pacing of the movie left a little to be desired, as while the film got to the action quickly and delivered relentless one-two punches of scenes of destruction and the "ark" scenes were good, the epilogue was far too short, and I ended up wanting a little more exposition on the future of mankind.

The science, or lack thereof, behind the movie: Who cares? It's a film. I happen to be a big fan of science, but one should never let it get in the way of a fun story. Moving on.

The special effects: Generally, they're well done but can be rather overwhelming. Although, I suppose that was to be expected. Most of the best scenes of destruction were in the trailers, so if you've seen those, you've probably seen most of them. Still, don't let that discourage you: it really is how the scenes are framed that provide much of their impact. It is a decent example of stunning visuals supplemented by the writing behind it. The scenes that existed were stunning, but I couldn't help being hungry for a bit more.

The score: I'm a bit of a music geek, so I tend to comment on a film's score as one of my first reactions to seeing it. At all times, the score was appropriate and adequately written, but rarely provided anything exceptional or out of the ordinary for a film score of this variety. It earns a passing grade, certainly, as it does what any film score is meant to do: to elevate the emotions behind the visuals and the writing.

To sum up, any viewer coming into this film really ought to know what to and what not to expect. If you know what to expect, and what you're expecting is what you're hoping to see, you will not be disappointed.

The cgi is outstanding, and well worth a rental. The soundtrack on blu ray is also impressive with lots of bass. As for the story, well thank goodness they spared us the 'parent separated from their child spending the whole movie trying to reunite with them', which is so often the plot of many disaster movies. And unlike most disaster movies where you only get a few minutes of special effects, this movie is choc a bloc with them.

So what's at fault? The story just misses in many ways. I wasn't happy with the list of who died and who lived -- there were some that didn't make it that impacted my satisfaction with the movie, and others I would have rather sacrificed. There were plot points that just got dropped at the end. For example, so much was made of the little girl's hats I fully expected it to eventually have some plot point to them -- to be like the glasses of water kid in the m night shamalayan movie. If there was a point to that, I missed it. And while there was some good vs evil themes and characters, some selfish versus altruistic moralising in the movie, the selfish really didn't get theirs, nor did the good really win. Much is made of the crassness and near evil of one politician, but he goes through the movie basically unchanged. The 'good' characters also seem to come through the movie relatively unchanged. So the movie ended more with a whimper than a bang in character development.

I think if they had worked on the story a little harder, as hard as they did the cgi, they'd have had a movie worthy of the spectacular special effects, one people would be rushing to buy. As it was, few of the characters made you really care about them one way or another. It's not that the movie wasn't good as a popcorn movie, it's just that with all that effort to make the special effects state of the art you wonder why they didn't work equally as hard to make the story compelling. Why put all that effort into a so so script with mediocre characterization? Most characters didn't grow or change. Those that did change, did so inexplicably, like the bratty kids suddenly becoming nice? Right, that's likely to happen. It was sloppy, hit or miss writing in that respect.

I also think it would have been good to go back to the Mayans who predicted the 2012 disaster and then bring it forward - seems odd to have a movie about the mayan prediction that ignored the mayan origin. I also would have liked to see more flooding. Lots of volcanos and earthquakes, but not so much flooding, until the end. While new york has been done to death, why not show london being submerged, the eye floating away? That was a missed opportunity. I also would have liked to see the end position of the continents: a sort of pangeatic configuration. This was talked of, but never shown.

Still, even though the story was weak, I would have purchased the blu ray for the cgi alone, because I enjoy disaster flicks, except for the price. 24.99 is just too much. If the story were compelling and uplifting, that would be another thing, but for cgi alone, as this was, this will stay a rental for me until the price comes down.

Were there flaws? Yes, as some of the other reviewers have noted, but this movie was highly entertaining, and very exciting through much of it. In fact, though the movie was long, I was never bored. There were parts of the story line that were totally unrealistic. Yet I made the decision to ignore that and just enjoy the flick. And I did. It's entertainment, and I was very entertained.

As another reviewer mentioned, the special effects sequences were worth the price of admission. I'm not sure why people put down special effects movies. I agree that there must be more to a film than that, but this one did have depth. The story showed complicated relationships being worked out, forgiveness, people maturing and taking responsibility, parental love and devotion, people fighting for what's right and a lot more. It also showed us the darker side of human nature as well. It was interesting.

I don't really believe that this exact situation is going to happen like this, and I don't believe that if this did happen, it would go down like this. And I don't really believe that John Cusack's character could have survived most of what his character pulled through. But who cares. It was exhilarating and a fun way to pass an afternoon.

I am going to keep this short. This was not the worst movie I have ever seen, however it was pretty bad. The story line was... well... ridiculous. The special effects were too over the top. Throughout the entire film I kept thinking the effects, while on one level were impressive, they were so unrealistic that they suspended my 'suspension of disbelief'. The movie really did deserve one star, but as I recently sat through "Furry Vengeance" I could not in good conscience lump it at the same level.

Emmerich films have been a bit uneven for me. He created a whole universe with Stargate, but then twisted history a bit with Mel Gibson in The Patriot. He created a great film in Independence Day and wiped out the World Trade Center before anyone thought about it, yet made a hammy, cheesy flick called Day After Tomorrow. His 10,000 BC had potential, but there were too many plot holes.

2012, despite its viral marketing campaign (or because of it) hyped the film to include the Mayan predictions and how we were all gonna experience a disaster in 2012, yet the Mayan prediction stuff was maybe two minutes of the film.

But I digress. John Cusak decently plays our divorced pal who has issues with his wife and new boyfriend (gosh, where have I seen that before?). Little daughter bonding (War of the Worlds remake); bratty son who has no respect and little sympathy from the audience (Day the Earth Stood Still remake); only the rich folks will get on the arks (with one guy saying the mobs will be fine and the critics saying "You think everyone will hold hands and sing Kumbaya?" (great line by the way) When Worlds Collide from the 50s had a similar storyline). Yet Emmerich puts it together!

Best scenes: Driving a Chevy around giant fissures and through buckling parking garages. Driving a van in a zig zag fashion, dodging fireballs; all the space scenes with sun flares!

Clearly Roland has watched the same films as me! The film took a little bit of every science fiction plot I've seen from the Fifties onward, and yet made a joyride out of disaster films.

I knew I was in trouble when the kid in the beginning of the film was playing with a model of the Titanic (does Cameron get a kick-back?).

[Possible spoiler] Little girl at the end, when everyone is safe, asks, "Daddy, when are we going home?"
Damn, wasn't that kid paying attention??

But seriously: California realistically sliding into the Pacific made me look at housing prices in Denver, CO. Giant tsunamis and floods made me consider waterfront property on Mt. Everest!

Yes, my review is silly -- but it's silly because the film tries so hard to bust out of its cardboard characterization and become something never done before -- and it has been done before -- but damn, what style!

Thanks Emmerich. Next time, give me more Mayans and less crazy radio guy in the mountains. (That was derivative too, if you know of the man who refused to evacuate during the Mt. St. Helens' eruption in 1980, but I digress)!

Must see in the theater to get the full effect like I did.

Emmerich films:

Independence Day [Blu-ray]
Stargate (Extended Cut) [Blu-ray]
The Patriot (Special Edition)
10,000 B.C.
The Day After Tomorrow (Widescreen Edition)