Title: 2012
Director: Ronald Emmerich
Running time: 2 hours 38 minutes
Genre: Sci-fi
What would you do if the world is going to end in two days? Such is one of the themes explored in the movie... some would accept their fate, some would try to survive while some would die without knowing why. The reason behind the end of the world depicted in 2012 is too advanced for me to understand... it has something to do with shifting of Earth crust... in conclusion, the earth is restructuring it's surfaces... some land will rise, some will crack and some will just simply sink into the bottom of the ocean.
This movie focuses on the struggle of several characters... the intelligent geologist Adrian Helmsly (Chiwetel Ejiofor) who is amongst the first to discover the shifting of Earth crust (apart from the Mayans and previous generations scientists) and later is the one who managed to increase the survivor numbers by several times more than previously arranged. Then, we have Jackson Curtis (John Cusack), a divorcee, who do accidentally stumbled on the top-secret and will do anything to save his ex-wife, children and ex-wife's bf. These are the two group/individuals with the extra screen time... while others have a relatively short (living) time :P.
I think that this movie is quite nice. I don't like all those "end of the world" movies. Of course, the theme of this movie is nothing new... in the 90s, the end of the world is usually caused by aliens and demons, then meteors and nowadays, they blame on Mother Nature. And as with most other "end of world" movies (except alien types), the movie focuses on several groups of people who in some way connects with each other even though they don't know each other. I have always thought of this type of style as boring since there is too little character development and everything would feel so rushed.
And yes, this movie does feel rushed but not in a bad way. It started off slow, and then it's just one obstacle over another. The "apocalypse" scenes were quite nicely done... although I think that they are a little over the top... the almost-like atomic explosion of volcano is so surreal... beautiful but deadly... but hey, I've never seen a super major earthquake/volcano eruption before, so who am I to complain? But I just love what they have done to Hawaii... it's a perfect beauty. Though I must say that they miss out some details like... people. Sure, some people would pop up here and then during the earthquake... but I a lot of the buildings were void with people when one of the actor drove his car through buildings to escape the earthquake.
The 'ark' thingy is also a nice touch... it's much better and more plausible than 'spaceships'. However, I think the biggest weakness of this movie is the lack of inspiring emotions. Sure, there are great speeches and great emotional scenes, but I just can't feel it... I've never cried once during the movie... and those who know me know that I cry easily during emotional scenes or speeches. For example, when a son told his father that the end of the world is coming and that his father is going to die far, far away from his son, I just can't feel those "happy that his son will live, and don't you worry about me since I had a good long life" kind of feeling.
And the romantic scenes are just unromantic... I was rolling my eyes heavenward when the ex-wife was screaming/praying/hoping that her ex-husband (soon to be husband again) will resurface from the water... it was like, ugh... :P
Anyway, I still think that this is an enjoyable movie although the casts' acting skills really need some polishing... but the writers did a hell of a good job.
Observation: The communication system in India and US must be very good... people are using phones left and right even though the whole world is being torn apart by natural disasters. :P
Bottomline: If it's any indication, the cinema for this movie was fully booked throughout the day that I had to travel to a cinema 1 hour away from my house and had to watch a late night movie even though I had to work the very next day. I seriously never heard of this movie before this.
Bamboo Ranking: 4.0 / 5.0
No comments:
Post a Comment