The World Will End, But Africa Will Rise Through It All

2012 is an epic adventure movie telling the story about global cataclysm that brings the end of the world and heroic struggle of the survivors with brilliant special effects, an amazing ensemble cast and a strong horrific story. 2012 will keep you glued to the screen for its 2hour 38-minute duration.

(Warning: Contains few spoilers)

The end of the world is coming in about 3 years from now according to the movie ‘2012’ and it’s theory is supported by Mayanism, and the 2012 phenomenon in its portrayal of catastrophic events unfolding in the year 2012 – which is apparently a truth according to Mayan calendars which some scientists have backed up these theories; making this movie all that more spine chilling because it’s based on non-fiction theories.

The movie has a large ensemble cast and starts in 2009 where an American geologist Adrian Helmsley (Chiwetel Ejiofo) meets his friend a doctor in India where he confides in Adrian that some huge solar flare (the perfect alignment of the sun, milky way and earth) will is cause microwave radiation and rapidly increasing the Earth’s core temperatures thus creating the Earth’s crusts to move. Forget Global Warming, because the inside of the earth is heating up hotter than Tiger Wood’s many mistresses.

Adrian takes this back to the U.S. where he shares this information with the White House Chief of Staff Carl Anheuser (Oliver Platt) and the U.S. President Thomas Wilson (Danny Glover). Adrian tells them that the Earth’s core heating up will result in a major catastrophic series of events, which will ultimately lead to the end of the world. This theory was first predicted by the Mayan’s 2012 Calendar which suggests that the world will end of 21 December 2012 – which is the date the world will end in the movie.

Flash forward to 2010 and at a G8 Summit Meeting the U.S. shares this rather devastating news with other heads of world. They then formulate a secret ‘save humanity’ project which consists of selecting 400,000 people across the world and building Arks for the safety of humanity to continue pass these predicted 2012 events. This is much like the biblical story of Noah’s Ark.

Additional tickets for these Arks are reserved for governments and armed forces. However the private sector is exposed to this plan and the selling of tickets are priced at €1 billion per person. These are only made available to the wealthiest of people in various nations – I can imagine the people must value their lives to fork out that amount especially in this ‘Recessitive Season’.

The rest of the public are kept in the dark about what is happening in 2012, well besides those who haven’t done their research about the Mayan Calendar and it’s predictions. Anyone who discovers this secret and poses a threat to exposing it is killed by Secret Services as illustrated at various points in the movie. This is not to create chaos amongst the public. However later in the movie, U.S. President Wilson makes an announcement in the midst of all the chaos about the end of the world.

The movie then flashes forward to 2012, which acts like present day. Jackson Curtis (John Cusack) is a divorced father, a writer and currently a part-time limousine driver for a wealthy Russian businessman named Yuri living in Los Angeles. Jackson takes his kids on a mini camping trip to Yellowstone National Park. There he meets a crazy guy named Charlie Frost (Woody Harrelson) who has a radio show broadcast from the National Park. Charlie Frost is a hermit whose a conspiracy theorists and speaks about the fact that the Mayan’s predicted the world would end in 2012. Fuelled with some evidence about the government hiding something, Charlie shares his theories with Jackson and tells him about these secret ‘space-ships’ the government is building and that he has the maps to the locations. Jackson dismisses Charlie, as a mad man doesn’t listen to him.

A major earthquake hits Los Angeles and almost kills Jackson’s ex-wife (Amanda Peet) and her current husband Gordon (Thomas McCarthy) when the earth splits and literally opens. However they survive, and Kate (Jackson’s Ex) calls for Jackson to bring the children back.

After the earthquake hits Los Angeles, the U.S. Government are alerted that the series of natural disasters predicted have begun and soon the world will end. Yuri being a major businessman is one of the people who have purchased tickets to board the Arc. Yuri is sent an SMS telling him ‘Boarding has begun for the Arc’ in which him, his mistress and two children need pack up their stuff and leave. Jackson, being the family’s driver; picks the family up and takes them to the airport. One of Yuri’s children slips to Jackson that they will board a ship and be saved while he and the rest of the world will die. It’s only then that Jackson puts what the crazy Charlie said and what the child match and begins to suspect that there is some truth to Charlie’s theories.

Jackson immediately hires a plane and sets off to pick his family up and save them. At first his family is reluctant to believe Jackson but as he arrives Los Angeles is hit with a massive earthquake. The family manages to escape the house before it falls apart. This is where the best part of the movie starts and most probably most of the $200,000 million budget (yes you read right – I also thought the U.S. was feeling the recession the worst until I learnt they forked out $200 million for a film!) Anyways I assume most of this high budge went to the special effects. It’s unexplainable and only can be enjoyed on the big screen. You literally watch Los Angeles get destroyed right in front of your eyes – it’s unbelievably brilliant filmmaking.

The theory behind the events is that the core of the Earth is heated up that Earth crust displacement and triggers major tsunamis, volcanoes and earthquakes. Thus the earthquake begins where the whole of Los Angeles literally cracks and slides into the Pacific Ocean killing millions. Eish those poor celebs, being the first to die.

Jackson and his family manage to escape – through some MAJOR luck and arrive at the airport where Gordon, Kate’s new husband is forced to fly them as the pilot has died – as they fly up they see Los Angeles is now completely destroyed. Jackson tells his family that it’s not just California, “it the rest of the world. It’s all going to end.”

They fly back to the Yellowstone National Park to meet Charlie and ask him where these ‘space-ships’ are so him and his family can be saved. Charlie tells him where to find the map just before the Yellowstone Volcano erupts killing Charlie and spitting lava almost killing the family, however they narrowly escape with the map and realise they have to travel to the Himalayas where these arks are constructed.

The movie follows the family’s journey to trying to get to the Arks where they battle and try to survive the various catastrophic natural disasters that claim cities around the world including earthquakes, mega tsunami’s, extreme climate changing with the shifting of the poles. The movie does have other plots and sub-plots which carry the viewers in suspense, anticipation throughout the movie’s 2-and-a-half-hour run including the biggest suspenseful, ‘will they make it or not’ question.

Bellow is a Spoiler For The Ending (But Also The BEST Part of the Movie):

Throughout the movie various cities around the world are shown to be affected by these natural disaster events. However there is no mention of Africa getting affected or anything; which does play on my mind the entire movie. It would be nice if they filmed a scene in Cape Town or Jozi showing the city being destroyed.

At the end of the movie Arks are successful and after a month of residing on the Arks, everyone is ready to get off and the geologists have noted that due to the Earth’s crust displacement the world has changed. After the floodwaters from the tsunami’s recede is it shown has different the earth has now changed it’s form.

Africa’s elevation rose higher than the sea level where all other continents are under water. Drakensburg Mountains (yes our Drakensburg mountains in KZN) is now the world’s highest. The cinema went wild with this. Everyone is shown to be sailing towards their new destination the Cape Town where Adrian notes “I guess why it was called ‘The Cape of Good Hope’”. The movie ends with Earth being shown from space showing a drastically modified African continent, which is now home for the 400,000 people in the year 0001.

Way to go Africa. Guess that was the highlight and the best part of the movie!

TRIVIA:

Here’s some Trivia’s I found on this movie:

• There’s a Television Spin-off for this movie in production chronicling the aftermath and the survivor’s lives from 2013 – except 2013 will be reset to Year 1 (0001).
• The President’s first and last names are the same as the 28^th U.S. President in real life. Woodrow Wilson’s first name is actually Thomas.
• Pre-Production began for this film before President Obama was elected to being America’s first African-American President, yet the role was still cast and created for an African-American actor. It went to Danny Glover.
• Around the world, some cinemas aired the movie’s Premiere at 8:12P.M. (20:12 in 24-hour time) in keeping with the movie’s title.
• The character Jackson Curtis (John Cusack) is the real name of 50 Cent (Curtis Jackson) backwards. Director Roland Emmerich is a big fan of rapper 50 Cent and wanted to name his lead character after him.
• Jackson’s son is named Noah. This is an obvious reference to the biblical story of Noah’s ark and foreshadows the use of “Arks” to save humanity from the impending disaster.

TRAILER

Review by Dane Samuel.

www.twitter.com/dane_g_samuel