Is this the prequel to Fox's "Ice Age"? It's certainly a better comedy.

Rating: Null/10 (18 September 2007)

"Godzilla" was marginally less dumb than the incredibly dumb "Independence Day". "The Day After Tomorrow" is marginally less stupid than "Godzilla". At this rate of improvement we should expect a terrific and intelligent movie from Roland Emmerich... somewhere around the year 2368. Alas, by then we'll have a real Ice Age (one that doesn't distinguish between the rich and the poor) hence nowhere to watch his great films...
TDAT is exactly what I expected it to be: not dull, good special effects, grand visual moments, cliché characters, filler scenes, sappy moments galore, a dumb premise, scientific gobbledygook, cretinous plot-devices, and political correctness of the most pathetic kind.
It's the year 2004. Emmerich is writing a script for Hollywood. It's an election year. Emmerich is upset. Hollywood is upset. "We can't allow Bush to win again! Hopefully Michael Moore's latest fantasy propaganda film will sway enough voters to vote Socialist!" Emmerich wants to live in a "better" world i.e. one in which he can still make 100-million dollar movies through corporation money - and still live in San Trope villas - while fighting those oh-so evil corporations and their damn damn Capitalism. "I know what I'll do... I, the greatest Germanic Roland of all time, will redefine the term 'poetic justice'. I will make those evil Americans look so foolish as they run away from an ice storm into Mexico. I am so smart! I will make those right-wing doubters show what their wicked Capitalism can do to nature and their precious America... And maybe I'll be rewarded by an Oscar or two for my blatant PC-ness..."
Roland Emmerich isn't the brightest cookie in the world. Nothing new there. Most Hollywood people have s*** for brains. One of Roland's silliest jabs at the much-hated Republicans is his dumb Vice-Presidential character, an obvious and subtle-as-a-f*rt allusion to Dick Chenney. Those scenes with Chenney making a fool out of himself in an international conference and then later again talking to Quaid are so utterly absurd that they just keep reminding you that you're watching an Emmerich movie, which means that anything silly can happen at any given moment. Of course, what Em doesn't know is that the REAL Chenney's I.Q. is actually larger than that of Ron and all the cast involved in this movie combined.
Evil, evil Capitalism and industry will bring an Ice Age! If only we drove those solar-energy-fueled cars that Robert Redford promoted, and if only we didn't use so much hair-spray!
Oh, those whining liberals with their "superior" theories on various political, social, and environmental issues... Poor misguides souls. So much emotion, so little rationale.
(Will this review get deleted, too? Does this site punish those who don't think Left? We'll see...)
Is ice politically correct? Is it Marxist? Does it work for Al-Qaida? I ask this because it seems that Ron's ice selects its victim-nations according to how much money they have. "Zambia?... No, I won't freeze Zambia. They are poor. It wouldn't be right. Must freeze evil America." Of course, Ron's Germany isn't evil. They're the good guys - as they've always been. Germany's frozen, too, but we don't get to see any of it...
Fortunately for Em, like most viewers of this movie I am not a meteorologist so I can't identify all the nonsense Em has managed to pile up here. But something tells me that at least half of the science here is malarkey. Gay cowboy Gyllenhaal and other characters here are outrunning tsunamis, encroaching ice even (that scene was DUMB!), hell - they're even outrunning wolves at one point! You name it - it's been outrun by someone or other in TDAT.
Speaking of wolves, why are Ron's wolves CGI wolves? Does it perhaps have something to do with the fact that even wolves are transformed into fantasy-land beasts of the apocalypse in Emmerich's movies, hence real wolves just wouldn't be good enough because they'd come off as a bunch of extra-furry dogs - which is all they really are. And what are they doing in Manhattan? So basically Em wants us to believe that in spite of there being millions of corpses to chew on, on the periphery of New York, the wolves had to go look for food ALL THE WAY in the center of NY?? The wolves appearing on that ship was the unintentionally funniest baloney Em came up with. It was very very funny.
To be fair, not all of Em's INTENDED gags misfired. The homeless guy saying "what about the garbage cans? There's always something to eat in the garbage" was very funny.
I also think that the library as the main setting in the second half was a very good idea. Emmerich comes from a country that has a tradition of book-burning, so the gags relating to that were to be sort of expected. They should have burnt Emmerich's scripts to keep warm...
Most of the movie is all gloom and doom. However, there is a bright side: all future Oscar ceremonies will be canceled in an Ice Age! Now why didn't the movie focus on that? More optimism is what the world needs.
What was the purpose of Quaid's absurd journey through Ice Age America? Just to see his son and say "hello"? Because that's exactly what happened. He didn't get him food or medicine, he just showed up and than a little later a helicopter came to pick them all up.
There was an extremely dumb scene (one of many) when the gay cowboy and his gal discussed their feelings - after half of NY was being engulfed by a tsunami! Does Em really think we the viewers give a toss about whether the sweet-voiced Gyll will hook up with his goody-two-shoes girl?
Gore and his environmentalist extremist doom-sayers will be laughed at in 50 years - while this movie will be hailed as a camp classic.