First Hit: Visual effects are the real story here which provide an interesting view of what might happen during a cataclysmic world event.
There are lots of things that get mixed up and are inaccurate in this film, like cell phones still working in India and the US when half the world is underwater, but for the most part the film is a fun ride of close calls.
John Cusack plays Jackson Curtis a writer, father and divorced limo driver who inadvertently comes across the US Government testing for the problems in the Earth’s core and crust while camping with his kids in Yosemite National Park.
While in Yosemite, he runs across a roving and raging independent radio broadcast reporter named Charlie Frost (played wonderfully by Woody Harrelson) who begins to convince him that there is a huge problem with the Earth and that the government is hiding it from everyone.
Another of the film’s stories is of a Geologist Adrian Helmsley (played by Chiwetel Ejiofor) who is working with a scientist in India who discovered that the core is heating up so fast that the world will end in a short period of time.
Helmsley speaks with the President who speaks with the other leaders of the world and they decide to create “Arks” to save a part of the human race along with its animals. Of course they don’t tell the populous, but offer up openings on the Arks to those who have the most money.
Meanwhile Jackson figures out that Frost’s ravings are correct that decides to save his children, divorced wife and her current husband. This begins the effects part of the film where there are more buildings falling, waves crashing, and cracks opening up in the Earth than one can ever imagine.
From this point on, the film is a roller coaster ride and it is fun to watch.
Roland Emmerich does a good job of giving us all sorts of fun effects; although some of them not very realistic, like driving through a falling building or flying between the minimal spaces between two buildings falling into each other. However, if one lets go of the accuracies and probabilities, then it is a fun rollick of a movie. Cusack mugs his way through being distraught and brave. I loved the kids Noah and Lily (played by Liam James and Morgan Lily respectively) doing their part to create a glue between the divorced parents in this traumatic situation. Ejiofor was solid as the Geologist as was Danny Glover as the President and Thandie Newton as the President’s daughter.
Overall: Not a great film for dialogue or content but fun to watch for the visual effects.