It's a disaster movie alright

Rating: 5/10 (15 November 2009)

I used to love watching disaster movies. They were all about the struggle to survive and making hard decisions. Now, they all seem to be about preaching morality, while shoehorning in a love story.
This movie in particular manages to have just about every disaster movie cliché in the book. They even hijacked a few clichés from other genres. Sprinkle in an unusually heavy dose of Deus Ex Machina and you have this movie.
This is a partial list (some items are "spoilers"):

Noble scientist who brings the problem to the attention of the government and serves as the moral guide, Check

Sleazy politician who makes the unpopular cold blooded decisions, check

Divorced everyman who tries to connect with his children, even though they seem to like their stepfather (who is more successful) more, check

Noble scientist who dies, but not before revealing a key piece of information, check

Noble scientist love interest, check

Sleazy rich man who tried to buy his way out of disaster, check

Black president (seems to happen quite often in disaster movie for some reason), check

Preachy monologue about keeping our humanity followed by a bold move to save people at the risk of other people, check

Conspiracy nut job who ends up being right, check

Nutjob finding the best place to watch the end/disaster and dying, check

Aircraft carrier being carried on giant wave and crushing something, check

Character doing something that's suicidal to save others, check

Character surviving a suicidal act, check

Saving a pet from disaster, check

Airlifting giraffes, check

Being chased by an explosion and/or cloud of smoke only to be overtaken and then suddenly burst through, check

Crazy disaster mitigation plan that shouldn't work but does, check

Critical piece of technology breaking and it can only be fixed by someone doing something suicidal, check

One leg of a love triangle getting killed allowing that bit of plot tension to be resolved without emotional baggage, check

Author who wrote a book that only sold a few hundred copies, but happens to meet someone who actually read the book, check

A child making an observation/comment that reveals the moral lesson, check

Character having a slightly unusual name that ends up foreshadowing future events, check

Bad science, check plus plus plus plus plus plus

Deus ex Machina, check plus

Anyway, if you have a high tolerance for such things, then you will probably enjoy the movie. There is some good acting by most of the main characters, although Danny Glover was awful. The special effects were quite good (which they should be) and occur pretty much continuously after the first half hour of the movie.