When I saw some of the shots in the trailer and particularly in the 5 minute escape from LA scene that was posted online, my jaw must have been about mid-chest. To see such a thorough obliteration of a city with the visual details that were in that scene was downright terrifying. Consequently, I was legitimately excited to see this film, if only for the look of it. The problem with that mindset is that only paves the way for disappointment later on.
I suppose "2012" is almost like a trophy date: fun to look at, but once you become acquainted the luster diminishes. If collapsing freeways, an exploding national park, and converging tsunamis large enough to consume entire continents ever could be described as lush, this is it. But for something that looks so rich how is it that I end up feeling cheap by the end of it?
I was not only ok with the protagonists narrowly escaping LA during a cataclysmic earthquake, I was thrilled by the excitement of it. In fact it was necessary to establish these main characters, out of all 6 billion people in the world, as being worthy of our attention. But to have yet another narrow escape in the same plane after the eruption of the Yellowstone caldera and again in Las Vegas when the ash cloud catches up to them is simply annoying and quite honestly, dumb.
The fatal flaw is that while the buildup was indeed ominous, the Mayan prediction of the 2012 phenomenon, the one thing that is responsible for this film even being considered by producers, seems to have only been included as an initial thought to give the rest of the movie a little extra credibility. The last two hours proceeds to have it shoved to the back burner. There is not even a mention of any dates during the course of the plot other than that it is the year 2012. The winter solstice never plays a role. The galactic alignment that will occur is mentioned briefly and the predicted solar maximum is included, but everything else seems to orbit around crust displacement theory.
"2012" insults the Mayan's abilities as astrologers by giving their prediction of the "end of the world" the ultimate Western treatment. The destruction of the Earth is not my problem. My problem is that there is no theme to support it. The Mayans merely predicted the end of our current cycle to occur in 2012. New Age theories talk about a shift in attitude, particularly Western materialism. The film sort of, kind of, perhaps, maybe explores these ideas. The people who do make it aboard the "arks" that are built to save humanity are those who are privileged enough to purchase tickets so of course, there is a sense of elitism and some conflict between a couple main characters calling for a more humane attitude. But by the time the credits roll, there isn't any real hope for change in the human species. More importantly it doesn't leave the audience to ponder anything fresh about our current 2009 society and what kind of changes we might like to see.
I foresee 4 films competing for the Best Visual Effects Oscar: Star Trek, The Lovely Bones, Avatar, and 2012. I don't know animation well enough to give an analysis, but I'm going to call it now that 2012 will be on the outside of the list of 3 nominees looking in.
