Review: 2012 Is Total Disaster-Porn Overload!

Review in a Hurry: Beyond ridiculous and overstuffed with dizzying computer effects, director Roland Emmerich's 2012 is a disaster pic that pulls no destructive punches. But at more than 2.5 hours, it's close to one earthquake too many.

The Bigger Picture: Are you familiar yet with the Mayan prophecy about the world ending on Dec. 21, 2012? If not, you're about to be. See, the Earth's crust is heating up, but it's got nothing to do with global warming!

As our tour guide through a planet-wide catastrophe, John Cusack stars as everyman Jackson Curtis, failed sci-fi writer, father and—conveniently!—chauffer to a wealthy Russian tycoon (Zlatko Buric). This is important because ever since 2009, the world's leaders (such as POTUS Danny Glover) and the superrich have been investing in a Noah's Ark-type project to save that which is "valuable for the survival of the human race."

Films like 2012 too often wallow in dialogue that feels less like how people actually talk and more like signposts for the audience to grab hold of. So when we see Thandie Newton looking over the Mona Lisa, we know that this is the Great Art of the World that must be saved—'cause the kindly old curator says as much. (That, and it's the Mona Lisa.)

In the wrong hands, this could be, well, a disastrous way to make a movie, and Emmerich has been a culprit in the past with The Day After Tomorrow and 10,000 BC. But 2012 works; those signposty speeches allow for a kind of logic amidst all the mayhem. And such mayhem!

Now, our hero's main goal is clear, for Cusack to just survive when L.A. undergoes the best-worst earthquake possible by today's CG. It can be really easy to lose focus in a film like this, but that never happens in 2012.

A great cast—including Chiwetel Ejiofor, Amanda Peet and Oliver Platt—make the crazed logic of it all go down much better, too.

They can't sell everything, though. Peet, as Cusack's ex-wife, try to frankly rebuild a marriage seems a bit pointless when Yellowstone is raining volcanic ash.

The 180—a Second Opinion: It's long. Really long. But for those who crave this kind of bloodless destructive force-of-nature fest, you could do a lot worse. Like The Day After Tomorrow, for starters.