2012

2012 is a 2009 science fiction movie directed by Roland Emmerich. The picture has an assembly cast, including John Cusack, Amanda Peet, Danny Glover, Thandie Newton, Oliver Platt, Chiwetel Ejiofor, and Woody Harrelson.

In 2009, American scientist Adrian Helmsley travels to India to meet his buddy Satnam, who has found that neutrinos from a massive solar flare have penetrated the Earth and are causing the temperature of its core to increase speedily. Adrian returns to Washington D.C. to inform White House Chief of Staff Carl Anheuser and US President Thomas Wilson that this will start a chain of events that will put an end to life in the world. At the 36th G8 summit in 2010, other heads of state and heads of government are made alert of the condition. They team up to begin a secret mission proposed to make sure the continuity of human life, intentionally choosing 400,000 people for admission on a series of enormous arks to be constructed in the Himalayas. To help fund the mission, extra persons are allowed to purchase tickets for one billion euros respectively.

In 2012, Jackson Curtis is a separated father who works as a limousine driver and writer in Los Angeles. His ex-wife Kate and their children Noah and Lily live with her new boyfriend, plastic surgeon and amateur pilot Gordon. Jackson takes Noah and Lily on a camping trip to Yellowstone National Park, where they meet Charlie Frost, a radio show host and conspiracy theorist. Charlie supports a hypothesis that says the Mayans predicted the world would be destroyed in 2012. The family returns home as cracks begin to build up along the San Andreas Fault in California and earthquakes occur in the San Francisco Bay area. Jackson grows suspicious and hires a private airplane to rescue his family. His family and Gordon when the Earth's crust dislocation begins and they flee Los Angeles as it collapses into the Pacific Ocean.

As millions begin dying worldwide, the group flies to Yellowstone to get from Charlie a map detailing the site of the arks. The group narrowly escapes as the Yellowstone Caldera erupts but Charlie is killed by the explosion. Realizing the arks are in China, the group meet Russian billionaire Yuri Karpov in Las Vegas, one of Jackson's limousine clients. Yuri, his twin sons, girlfriend Tamara, and pilot Sasha join up the group as they acquire a larger plane and go across the Pacific. Also bound for the arks aboard Air Force One are Anheuser, Adrian, and First Daughter Laura Wilson. President Wilson stayed back in Washington D.C. and addresses the nation one last time about what's happening. He is shortly killed by a tsunami. Anheuser appoints himself acting Commander-in-Chief.

Yuri, who bought ark tickets for himself and his sons, deserts the Curtis family, Gordon, and Tamara upon arriving in China in a crash-landing that kills Sasha. However, the deserted group is picked up by Nima, a Buddhist monk. Together, they begin sneaking on an ark with the help of Nima's brother Tenzin, an ark mission worker. Adrian gets a call from Satnam, who shortly dies in a tsunami. Learning that a second tsunami is approaching, Anheuser orders the arks be sealed before the boarding is complete, trapping thousands outside. Adrian manages to persuade the other G8 leaders to let the left behind people on board. As the ark's drawbridges are lowered, Gordon is crushed between the gears, which soon become tangled with a thick cable. Yuri sacrifices his life to get his two sons on in time, but the cable stops the gate from closing, rendering the ship incapable to start its engines. The tsunami arrives and starts to flood the ark, drowning Tamara and setting the ark helplessly drift. Jackson and Noah fix the closing mechanism.

When the floodwater from the worldwide tsunamis ultimately decreases, satellite data shows that Africa rose in relation to sea level and may not have flooded at all. In fact, the tallest mountains in the world have been repositioned from the Himalayas to the Drakensberg mountain range in South Africa. As three arks set sail for the Cape of Good Hope, Jackson reconciles with his family, and Adrian starts an affair with Laura. The movie ends with a view of the Earth showing the dramatically-changed African continent.

It was released on 13th Nov' 2009. Rotten Tomatoes reports that 39% of critics gave the movie a positive review, based upon a sample of 174 reviews, with an average score of 5 out of 10. It is similar to The Day After Tomorrow (2004, Roland Emmerich).