"Look upon my works, ye mighty, and despair."

Rating: 7/10 (14 November 2009)

OMG, there's George Segal! Holy moly, he must be in his 70s by now. He was a leading man back in the day, one of Hollywood's most promising up and comers. He was even in "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" Now, here he is in a bit part as a musician on a vacation cruise liner. He's all craggy and old now, but it's good to see him alive and well and ....
Uh, I guess we should talk about the movie. The world goes blooey! The end. Actually, there's more to discuss, but that's the whole plot in a nutshell. If that's not what you want in a movie, better steer clear.
This movie should have ended showing 500 people all taking a bow. That's the army it took to bring this CGI catastrophe epic to the screen. Think of all of them taking their families to the opening and being able to say, "See the part where the tsunami tosses the aircraft carrier on top of the White House? I had a hand in that." The kid replies, "Gosh mom, you rock!"
I've always heard about the earthquake where one day California slides into the ocean. It's clear the filmmakers said, "Everyone has heard that California one day will slide into the ocean. Let's actually show it." And they do! If you see this movie you will see Malibu (or maybe Venice Beach) tilt up and slide right into the waves.
In the trailer, you see all these gigantic catastrophes and might think you're seeing the end of the movie. You are not. That all happens about halfway through. The first half hour of the movie is set-up. It all begins in 2009 (whoa, the same year as the movie's release!). Scientists discover things going on deep underground that "just can't be true." Warnings are sounded. Governments are put on alert. Then 2012 arrives and fissures appear, the surface of the earth begins to collapse, buildings fall ... It looks like mankind itself will not make it. But ... and then comes the second half of the movie, which I will not reveal. But I'll hint — the species survives.
What do you see get destroyed? Southern California, of course. Las Vegas. Yellowstone National Park. East India. Washington, D.C. Tibet. What am I leaving out ...
Star John Cusack has a movie family. He's estranged from his wife. His little son and daughter have issues. Mom's seeing the plastic surgeon neighbor, who ends up a key character. Woody Harrelson (Hi Woody! Loved Zombieland!) chimes in as a crazy hippie prophet who gives info to Cusack so he's one step ahead as events go south. There's a superrich Russian oligarch (the movie's more or less bad guy). A brave Russian pilot. A sympathetic Russian bimbo mistress (whose fate is shamefully glossed over). There's also the president's chief of staff played by Oliver Platt who's basically doing a take on Henry Kissinger at his most Strangelovian.
Roland Emmerich, all along you've been the guy who when Hollywood comes around and says, "Roland, will you take all the money in Switzerland and make the most eyepoppingest movie imaginable?" has always modestly said, "Why, yes."
Here's to you.