Nobody knows what happened, but there were tsunamis, volcanic activity, lots of earthquakes that aren’t 2012 level, and massive air contamination (people died in their cars, otherwise untouched). The protagonist and his fiance survive, including by kiling a “helpful” neighbor who tries to kill him and by barely escaping what appears to be Mt. St. Helens erupting again at the end as they head north into Canada. Forest Whitaker finds respect for him and even seems to almost like him before his character passes away from wounds received over the journey west.
Though I can find zero evidence other than my own observations, I definitely think something has happened to Forest Whitaker’s vocal ability, and this became notable to me in Arrival. I know at times he is going for different character voices, but still something has seemed ‘off’ since that film. After I see him in something since then, I always check to see if he has some surgery or other issue and do not find anything - but I still feel it has changed.
Well, he always has had that lazy eye condition, I think it is the left one. There is one scene in this not-so-great film where it looks almost closed.
Wait, “barely escaping”? Looks to me like they were about to be swallowed up by volcano spew and then, bam, credits. If that was an escape, the movie was pretty coy about it. Did I misread the final scene?
Okay, now I know I really wasn’t paying attention. I know at one point they decide to forage for supplies in front of a waterslide, but there was a whole amusement park back there? I distinctly remember thinking, “Welp, if a beat-up old waterslide is all they can muster for an apocalyptic setting, they must have blown their budget on those four or five cars they banged up…”
tom, I am shocked. It is Theo James, who was the sexy hunkster in the “Divergent”/“Insurgent” series (teen girl saves world films). I would have though you’d have watched those movies a hundred times by now…He also had a reoccurring role in the Underworld movies.
Dammit, and he’s a Brit, too! I hate it when people in movies trick me into thinking they’re Americans. The Australians are the sneakiest, but the Brits are a close second.
It was incredibly stupid and awful, but I love the genre so much that I find things to like about it - mainly by ignoring the movie in its entirety, other than the premise for the cataclysm and perhaps some resulting carnage, and incorporating them into my own imagination to craft a far more interesting story.
In this case, I loved the premise of the magnetic poles suddenly switching (which clearly was the disaster depicted, although for annoying reasons it wasn’t explained) - the aurora lights; the tide shifts and resulting volcanic and seismic activities, the compass going wacky, the birds being unable to navigate, the GPS being unavailable, communications being unavailable, the crazy storm, etc.
But the movie was so colossally stupid. I really disliked every actor other than Forrest. There are never enough people around to reflect the chaos. So many imbecilic and contrived occurrences (the one wall left intact for blocks is the one someone wrote a message on, and that message doesn’t even have dust on it?), the guy insta-finds one of the rarest and valuable tools he needs seconds after he needs it to survive, people acting crazy for no reason, unexplained weirdness that doesn’t seem to fit the rest of the disaster like what happened to the train, the complete absence of any authority or explanation after the first few hours
Ah, that’s a good catch with the reversing poles bit. I didn’t know how much misdirection was going on as I watched, but I think you’ve definitely got it.
I know, right? This always drives me crazy in apocalypse movies. A real apocalypse would be an insanely massive refugee crisis in any populated area, and especially in cities. But it’s a budget constraint in movies. The same one that means most scenes will be shot on poorly traveled country roads instead of superhighways. Walking Dead, for instance.
One of things I loved about Spielberg’s War of the Worlds was that he had the vision (and budget) to portray that crisis.
Just to not be entirely negative (although it wouldn’t be unreasonable to do so), there were a few things I liked:
the fact that although some people acted unreasonably savage, some people did not: like the guys who took the gas, but didn’t want to shoot; the soldier who was convinced to let them pass; the family stopping to pick up a lone traveler and naturally being suspicious, but being willing to do it; and the gal ultimately deciding to just bugger off and not wanting anything further to do with them, which is about the only thing in the movie I wasn’t expecting to happen (and them later being screwed because of her absence).
