Day After Tomorrow: anything for a buck

When I saw the Quicktime trailer for The Day After Tomorrow for the first time, I caught my breath. It looked awesome. But then for one reason or another, I missed it in the theaters. Last night, I happened to catch it on HBO. It was a colossal Weather Channel disaster epic, but the scientific premise was lacking. And the general plot, even more so.

For decades, global warming has been written up and clamored about as a growing problem. But mostly, it’s been debated to death. If this movie is supposed to be a cautionary tale, it fails. But as a CGI vehicle, it’s like special effects pornography. Oh, and there’s a love story, a family-in-crisis plot line and some political tension — neither here nor there — it’s like the director Roland Emmerich just threw in the kitchen sink, typical behavior for a summer blockbuster, I suppose.

(I mention the director’s name because the only I’ve ever walked out of was his remake of Godzilla (1998). He also did Independence Day, a little better than Godzilla but not by a whole lot.)

For a disaster movie, there isn’t much destruction — after the first 20 minutes, I gave up on the dialogue. I mean Los Angeles gets thumped by a series of gi-normous tornadoes, taking out the Capitol Records building and disintegrating the Hollywood sign. But New York — hit by a tidal wave of water — suffers frozen skyscrapers (none fall over) and I never felt a clear sense of danger. Sure, wolves (from the zoo) wander the streets of Manhattan and ice balls the size of a human head pelt Tokyo, but what really happens? The northern hemisphere gets really cold, all Central and South American debt gets erased and the air gets clearer. Nothing Dennis Quaid’s snowshoes can’t handle.

Come on. Global warming and/or climate change is a serious issue that deserves thoughtful treatment. This movie is not that treatment.

As a side note, it was storming in south Austin last night and so it was interesting for the duality of watching a disaster movie while it’s thundering outside pretty fierce.