kinda awful but fun

Rating: 5/10 (13 November 2009)

Make no mistake about this film it is a gargantually...retarted movie. It may be one of the worst movies I've ever seen in fact but I still managed to have a pretty good time. I know many of you will be saying well what did you expect it's from the director of Day After Tomorrow, Independence Day, Stargate, 10,000 BC, The Patriot and Universal Soldier. All for which I can say I enjoyed some much more than others. To me his films have always been fine tuned popcorn machines. The truth about 2012 is it's kind of a mess and I don't think he's ever really made a bad movie, this is a bad movie. If your not getting the jist of what I'm trying to say let's put it this way for those of you who had problems with XXX being unrealistic beware. Because this is the most jaw droppingly silly film ever made. What's it about? Basically the prophecy of world apocalypse from the Mayan civilization brutally ripped apart and dumbed down by the Hollywood machine. You don't care about any of the characters well except for Jimi Mistry, oddly enough. The acting is mediocre(John Cusack) to horrendous (Amanda Peet) and there are just some really weird ones thrown in (Woody Harrelson). The visual effects are striking at times and really cheestastic at others. The green screen is so majorly overused too much in this film. What the film does have to offer is an admirable devotion to its stupidity which makes the proceedings at times to be so extremely entertaining. In fact for most of the film I was pretty much on board. The LA scene outlined in the trailer and TV spots isn't really suspenseful but it's shockingly fun. But in it's ponderous last 40 mins it lost me mainly with an unintentionally laughable moment with a stereotypical Russian thug and a flying kid. And it's a moment that will be remembered forever. It's in that moment that I realized that nothing can really, truly redeem this film from it's obsurdity and length. So with that I say that I'm happy that I saw it and may peek again on DVD just for a few scenes but another full viewing the future does not hold. All in all not the disturbing impact you'd effect but if anything discourages any realistic fear aligned with prophecy altogether.