Utterly appalling

Rating: 1/10 (16 November 2009)

Roland Emmerich movies are generally stupid but fun but with 2012 he has redefined 'idiotic' with his latest effects driven drivel about the end of the world. Quite what the Mayans have to do with anything is lost after about 5 minutes as the selling point in the trailer turns out to be a red herring but the film as a whole is a half dead slightly damp haddock. Considering that the film has gotten some half decent actors in it the level of acting on display would not even trouble an episode of the old Brit soap 'Crossroads' as pointless one liners and impossible dialogue is trawled out in a by the numbers journey from A to B with lots of explosions and buildings and even cities falling over. The idea John Cusack could have taken his family from California to China in the way presented is so utterly preposterous that even by Hollywood standards it beggars belief. Barely a frame is believable except for the premise that is central to the film. As ordinary people die by the millions live on video feed we see that worthless politicians have been selling places on the last ship out of town to the even more worthless rich, 'important', and the royal as the rats forget the rest of us and save their pointless asses as their people, who don't seem quite that important now, die in droves under earthquake and tsunami. For me as a Brit the sight of an 80 year old woman saving two corgis as she deserts the British people is far more horrifying than seeing LA fall into the sea. Instead of ensuring the human survival by filling the places with as many people under 30 as can be gotten on board we have fat Russian billionaires and old rich guys in large staterooms who bought their places with status they no longer have once the first quake hits. Now that bit is totally believable. As long as the rich, a stupid but very fortuitous family and a dog are saved we are supposed to feel fine at the end. Personally I was hoping that all the 'rats' got washed away by a tsunami and ended up dying horribly and we carried on as a race due to a few lucky souls on high ground. Hollywood surely has reached it's nadir with this rubbish as after this huge waste of money it is inconceivable that anything worse will hit the screens anytime soon.