Upcoming Feature. 2012.

I have not prayed since junior high but I pray tonight that Roland Emmerich’s “epic adventure about a global cataclysm that brings an end to the world and tells of the heroic struggle of the survivors” is the coolest movie I have ever seen. I cannot think of a more fitting film for our day and age than a plot-less thrill fest starring John Cusack. I will make sure I bring my barf bag along when I don’t attend the premier. And who knows, perhaps fortune will smile on the man who brought us an A-list of instant classics. 10,000 BC, The Day After Tomorrow, Godzilla. Need I continue? (Mad props to Independence Day.) The ultimate in movie promotion would be for the chronicled events to come true, as is prophesized: the final realization of life imitating art with Emmerich as the finest artistic craftsmen the world has seen. I hereby predict that 2012 will be the epitome of filmmaking prowess and testament to cinematic virtuosity. Emmerich, literally, has the hands of God and any and all things he touches turn to motion picture gold.

Now, I should not discount the credibility of this film just yet. The star studded cast and flawless visuals should carry this masterpiece to the Oscars and back, arms loaded. If you have not checked out the trailer yet, do so, music courtesy of The Shining. And when you’re done, don't miss five minutes of the film. The visuals here will knock your socks off, the arc of each character is present from the first frame, is this real or fake? To get of sense of how mind blowing this story is and how Emmerich and his team captured the verisimilitude of this event, see it without the subjective, eyewitness footage.

I feel that with this film American Cinema will reach the pinnacle of its artistic and socially-conscious success. Take every important and concerned documentary, fuse it with the richest and most beautiful art films, and inject it with the availability and universal acclaim of a child’s film, and what is the product? Roland Emmerich’s 2012. This film is not only a prophecy as to how the world will end, it is a prophecy as to the future of American movie making. This is a future concerned about the world, where everyone is lent a helping hand, and where no one is left on the top of a mountain to be killed by a tidal wave.

Not only will this film be a social and historical achievement but also, and theorists and critics would agree, it will be a technological achievement as well. Straying from the much overwrought digital drawing and graphics that afflict many modern films, Emmerich returns to the roots with good old-fashioned stunts and extras. A cast of tens of thousands of extras showed up to help, free of charge, with the film. Stunts took place in and around both New York and L.A. Extras hurled themselves from falling skyscrapers, jammed cars on collapsing highways, and dove headfirst into bottomless rifts. And the most wonderful evidence of this film as a true social force, the Mother Teresa of movies, the Ghandi of the silver screen, is the expected $2 billion dollars of profit will go to feed the poor. So, be American. Help others. Lend a hand by supporting local cinema and go spend that dollar on 2012 if it's the last thing you do.