Entertaining, but not as grand as it could have been...

Rating: Null/10 (3 June 2004)

**POSSIBLE SPOILERS** The Day After Tomorrow is an undeniably entertaining movie, with great special effects and a half-way decent story. However, this film should have been about the plight of all of mankind rather than the shared adventures of Jake Gyllenhall and his school friends; it could have been an epic science fiction story rather than a popcorn flick. Using global warming as the foundation for a movie about Dennis Quaid falling into a crevasse, a helicopter crash, a wolf attack, and a few storm sequences seems to trivialize the actual consequences of a large scale climate change. Global warming is an epic phenomenon and it should have been treated as such. For example, in the end, when the people are leaving New York, I would have liked to see the pack of wolves trot across a street (without snarling viciously or attacking anyone), thus signaling the return of wildlife to soon-to-be-deserted cities. With that said, I was still very entertained and enjoyed the movie's not-so-subtle criticism of George Bush and his cronies. The Day After Tomorrow is no classic, but it will certainly rule the box office for a few weeks.