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| writer = Harald Kloser<br />Roland Emmerich
| writer = Harald Kloser<br />Roland Emmerich
| starring = [[John Cusack]]<br />[[Chiwetel Ejiofor]]<br />[[Amanda Peet]]<br />[[Thandie Newton]]<br />[[Oliver Platt]]<br />with [[Danny Glover]]<br />and [[Woody Harrelson]]
| starring = [[John Cusack]]<br />[[Chiwetel Ejiofor]]<br />[[Amanda Peet]]<br />[[Thandie Newton]]<br />[[Oliver Platt]]<br />with [[Danny Glover]]<br />and [[Woody Harrelson]]
| music = Harald Kloser<br />[[Thomas Wander]]
| music = [[Harald Kloser]]<br />[[Thomas Wander]]<br />[[James Seymour Brett]] (additional score)
| cinematography = [[Dean Semler]]
| cinematography = [[Dean Semler]]
| editing = [[David Brenner (editor)|David Brenner]]<br />Peter S. Elliott
| editing = [[David Brenner (editor)|David Brenner]]<br />Peter S. Elliott

Revision as of 23:02, 5 November 2009

2012
Theatrical poster
Directed byRoland Emmerich
Written byHarald Kloser
Roland Emmerich
Produced byRoland Emmerich
Mark Gordon
Harald Kloser
Larry J. Franco
Ute Emmerich
StarringJohn Cusack
Chiwetel Ejiofor
Amanda Peet
Thandie Newton
Oliver Platt
with Danny Glover
and Woody Harrelson
CinematographyDean Semler
Edited byDavid Brenner
Peter S. Elliott
Music byHarald Kloser
Thomas Wander
James Seymour Brett (additional score)
Production
companies
Centropolis Entertainment
The Mark Gordon Company
Distributed byColumbia Pictures
Release date
November 13, 2009 (worldwide)
Running time
158 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$200 million[1]
This article is about the film. For metaphysical and cosmological predictions centered on December 21, 2012, see 2012 phenomenon.

2012 is an upcoming disaster film directed by Roland Emmerich. The film has an ensemble cast, including John Cusack, Amanda Peet, Danny Glover, Thandie Newton, Oliver Platt, Chiwetel Ejiofor, and Woody Harrelson. The film will be distributed by Columbia Pictures. Filming began in August 2008 in Vancouver. The film's release date is expected to be November 13, 2009 worldwide.

Plot

The film explores the idea of a global doomsday event coinciding with the end of the Mayan Long Count Calendar's current cycle on or around 2012 (the northern hemisphere's winter solstice).

Jackson Curtis (John Cusack) is a divorced father who occasionally works as a limousine driver and a writer, while his ex-wife (Amanda Peet) and children live together with her new boyfriend. In Guatemala reports start coming in of mass suicides in the Mayan jungles of people attempting to avoid the impending apocalypse. The IHC (Institute for Human Continuity), a secret organization, has realized the situation and begins constructing vast arks beneath the Himalayan mountains designed to withstand most natural disasters in order save both the human race, significant sentient species and the greatest treasures of mankind for when doomsday finally happens. There are arguments however about how and when the governments of the world will alert their fellow citizens and even discussions about how the remaining survivors will be selected to survive Armageddon.

Meanwhile on a day trip to Yellowstone with his two young children, Jackson meets Charlie Frost, who hosts his own radio segment and blog about his belief that the Mayans are correct about 2012. Over the coming days vast cracks are found withing the fault lines in California, and despite the pleas from the government that everything is fine, Jackson isn't convinced. Hiring a private plane and gathering crucial supplies he races to his ex-wife's LA home to save himself and his family from the Earth's crust displacement occurring all around them. After a long and dangerous race through the downtown streets to get to the airfield, Amanda's new boyfriend Gordon uses his pilot skills to get the family to safety. As they look back the entire cityscape of Los Angeles has already started to tilt downwards into the Pacific.

When they discover that the global cataclysm is happening much faster than expected, they must race to these ships in order to save the human race before all is lost. It soon becomes clear that it's not just LA that's experiencing disaster, the Yellowstone Supervolcano erupts, more massive earthquakes occur in South America which destroys the city of Rio de Janeiro. Washington, D.C. gets flooded by an enormous tidal wave which crushes the White House, and The Vatican in Rome crumbles into oblivion, destroying thousands of years of catholic architecture and killing hundreds of worshipers within seconds. As worldwide floodings begin to climb over the Himalayas, the US government declares the end of the world.

A group of survivors, including Jackson Curtis and his family must fight their way to China before they can board the great arks and save themselves from the gigantic tidal waves sweeping across the Earth.

Production

Director Roland Emmerich and composer-producer Harald Kloser co-wrote a spec script titled 2012, which was marketed to major studios in February 2008. Nearly all studios met with Emmerich and his representatives to hear the director's budget projection and story plans, a process that the director had previously gone through with the films Independence Day (1996) and The Day After Tomorrow (2004).[2] The film was shopped around with a production budget of $200 million.[3] Later that month, Sony Pictures Entertainment won the rights for the spec script, planning to distribute it under Columbia Pictures.[4] The studio planned to make the film for less than the estimated budget.[3]

Filming was originally scheduled to begin in Los Angeles, California, in July 2008,[5] but instead commenced in Vancouver in August 2008 and concluded in January 2009.[6] Due to the possible 2008 Screen Actors Guild strike, filmmakers set up a contingency plan for salvaging the film.[7] Sony Pictures Imageworks was hired to create visual effects for 2012.[8] Thomas Wander co-wrote the score with Harald Kloser.

Cast

Marketing

On November 12, 2008, the studio released the first teaser trailer for 2012 that showed a tsunami surging over the Himalayas and interlaced a purportedly scientific message suggesting that the world would end in 2012, and that the world's governments were not preparing its population for the event. The trailer ended with a message to viewers to "find out the truth" by searching "2012" on search engines. The Guardian criticized the marketing effectiveness as "deeply flawed" and associated it with "websites that make even more spurious claims about 2012".[16]

The studio also launched a viral marketing website operated by the fictional Institute for Human Continuity, where filmgoers could register for a lottery number to be part of a small population that would be rescued from the global destruction.[17] David Morrison of NASA has received over 1000 inquiries from people who thought the website was genuine and has condemned it, saying "I've even had cases of teenagers writing to me saying they are contemplating suicide because they don't want to see the world end. I think when you lie on the internet and scare children in order to make a buck, that is ethically wrong."[18] Another viral marketing website promotes Farewell Atlantis, a fictional suspense novel by the film's lead protagonist, about the events of 2012.[19]

Comcast had also organized a "roadblock campaign" to promote the film, where a two-minute scene from the film was broadcast across 450 American commercial television networks, local English and Spanish language stations, and 89 cable outlets within a 10-minute window between 10:50 PM EDT/PDT and 11:00 PM EDT/PDT on October 1, 2009.[20] The scene featured the destruction of Los Angeles and ended with a cliffhanger, with the entire five-minute-38-second clip made available on Comcast's Fancast web site. The trade newspaper Variety estimated that, "The stunt will put the footage in front of 90% of all households watching ad-supported TV, or nearly 110 million viewers. When combined with online and mobile streams, that could increase to more than 140 million".[20] Sony also plans on replicating this promotion in other regions.[20]

Controversies

An interview with Roland Emmerich stated that they did think about including the Kaaba but his co-writer did not allow him to do so -

"Well, I wanted to do that, I have to admit, but my co-writer Harald [Kloser] said, 'I will not have a fatwa on my head because of a movie.' And he was right. We have to all, in the western world, think about this. You can actually let Christian symbols fall apart, but if you would do this with [an] Arab symbol, you would have ... a fatwa, and that sounds a little bit like what the state of this world is. So it's just something which I kind of didn't think was an important element, anyway, in the film, so I kind of left it out."

Emmerich has no qualms about wrecking other major landmarks, however. The massive dome of St. Peter's Basilica in the Vatican rolls on top of a crowd of churchgoers. The huge Christ the Redeemer statue that looms over Rio de Janeiro disintegrates. And, of course, the White House gets crushed when a wave drops the aircraft carrier John F. Kennedy on top of it.[21]

Release

2012 was originally scheduled to be released on July 10, 2009. The release date was changed to November 13, 2009 to move out of the busy summer schedule into a time frame that the studio considered to have more potential for financial success. According to the studio, the film could have been completed for the summer release date, but the date change will give more time to the production.[22]

Television spin-off

Speaking to Entertainment Weekly, Emmerich confirmed that a television series based upon the film was in the works. The series will serve as a sequel to the film and is planned to focus on a group of survivors in 2013.[23]

See also

References

  1. ^ http://www.welt.de/kultur/article4680874/Roland-Emmerich-dreht-Shakespeare-in-Babelsberg.html
  2. ^ Fleming, Michael (February 19, 2008). "Studios vie for Emmerich's 2012". Variety. Retrieved July 14, 2008. {{cite journal}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= and |date= (help)
  3. ^ a b c d e Simmons, Leslie (June 2, 2008). "Danny Glover circles 2012". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved July 14, 2008. {{cite journal}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= and |date= (help); Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
  4. ^ Fleming, Michael (February 21, 2008). "Sony buys Emmerich's 2012". Variety. Retrieved July 14, 2008. {{cite journal}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= and |date= (help)
  5. ^ Siegel, Tatiana (May 19, 2008). "John Cusack set for 2012". Variety. Retrieved July 14, 2008. {{cite journal}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= and |date= (help)
  6. ^ a b Frater, Patrick (July 9, 2008). "Chin Han makes date with 2012". Variety. Retrieved July 14, 2008. {{cite journal}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= and |date= (help)
  7. ^ "Big Hollywood films shooting despite strike threat". Reuters. August 1, 2008. Retrieved August 5, 2008. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= and |date= (help)
  8. ^ Giardina, Carolyn (August 13, 2008). "SPI's future includes 2012". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved August 13, 2008. {{cite journal}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= and |date= (help)
  9. ^ Foywonder, The (October 02, 2009). "Five Hilariously Disaster-ffic Minutes of 2012". Dred Central. Retrieved October 02, 2009. {{cite journal}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= and |date= (help)
  10. ^ Simmons, Leslie (June 13, 2008). "Amanda Peet is 2012 lead". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved July 14, 2008. {{cite journal}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= and |date= (help); Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
  11. ^ "Morgan Lily". Variety. August 3, 2008. Retrieved October 29, 2008. {{cite journal}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= and |date= (help)
  12. ^ Kit, Borys (July 1, 2008). "Thomas McCarthy joins 2012". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved July 14, 2008. {{cite journal}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= and |date= (help)
  13. ^ Simmons, Leslie (May 19, 2008). "John Cusack ponders disaster flick". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved July 14, 2008. {{cite journal}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= and |date= (help)
  14. ^ Rich, Katey (15 July 2008). "Woody Harrelson Trying To Survive Armageddon". Cinema Blend. Retrieved 2009-02-03.
  15. ^ Adler, Shawn (July 14, 2008). "EXCLUSIVE: Woody Harrelson Joins Roland Emmerich's World-Ending 2012". MTV Movies Blog. MTV. Retrieved July 14, 2008. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= and |date= (help)
  16. ^ Pickard, Anna (November 25, 2008). "2012: a cautionary tale about marketing". The Guardian. Retrieved December 10, 2008. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= and |date= (help)
  17. ^ Billington, Alex (November 15, 2008). "Roland Emmerich's 2012 Viral - Institute for Human Continuity". FirstShowing.net. Retrieved December 10, 2008. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= and |date= (help)
  18. ^ Connor, Steve (17 October 2009). "Relax, the end isn't nigh". The Independent. Retrieved 2009-10-20.
  19. ^ http://farewellatlantis.com/
  20. ^ a b c Graser, Mark (September 23, 2009). "Sony readies 'roadblock' for 2012". Variety. Retrieved 2009-09-29.
  21. ^ {{cite web|url=http://movies.yahoo.com/feature/movie-talk-roland-emmerich-fatwa.html
  22. ^ DiOrio, Carl (January 20, 2009). "2012 release date pushed back". Retrieved January 20, 2009. {{cite journal}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= and |date= (help); Cite journal requires |journal= (help); Text "journalThe Hollywood Reporter" ignored (help)
  23. ^ http://hollywoodinsider.ew.com/2009/11/04/2012-tv-planned/
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