Blogcritics: Comments on The Day After Tomorrow: Running from Air

Comment by Chris Kent

Wed, 23 Jun 2004 10:36:30 EDT

Day After Tomorrow is a fairly awful film. I had the good fortune of viewing it with an audience that loved the damn thing. And it WAS entertaining in parts. The movie bumbles through inconsistent political stands, poor plot turns, predictable character speeches and agonizingly derivative scenes. Roland Emmerich doesn't really make films more than he comes up with "neat" special effects ideas, and then plops a weak movie upon them. He rips off Godzilla, War of the Worlds, The Right Stuff, Star Wars, Earthquake, Twister and any number of past, superior films, putting together a predictable patchwork quilt knowing full well that the audience dynamic numbers 70% kids who don't have the brains to know any film made before the year 2000. It's all about putting together a nice FX package and racing to the bank to deposit the bucks. Roland Emmerich is a proud graduate of the Jerry Bruckheimer school of commercial filmmaking. Give the kids generic explosions because they are too dumb to know any better. That being said, I enjoyed The Day After Tomorrow though suspect if I viewed it a second time on DVD would likely hate it. That also being said, I enjoyed Alan's terrific review and his comparisons to many of the great disaster films of the 1970s......

Comment by marc

Sun, 20 Jun 2004 19:14:09 EDT

QUOTE Well, when I see that a movie review seems to be some sort of political commentary, it turns me off from seeing what the author has to say about the movie. UNQUOTE The same can be said about the movie itself. If the movie is an obvious attempt at political proaganda it should also be avoided.

Comment by Ms. Tek

Sun, 20 Jun 2004 18:22:54 EDT

"your extremely limited notion " Actually, I don't have a "limited notion". Maybe I am just sick of politics in every damn thing. Still, I am sure there will be many on here who appreciate your liberal bashing... This is blogcritics after all.. the haven for the right. I just kinda wish this post had been in et cetera... then I would have known what I was reading before I started. Please excuse my stupidty. *rolls eyes*

Comment by Alan Dale

Sun, 20 Jun 2004 17:47:45 EDT

I actually put this phrase in the review--"That pretty much covers the movie as entertainment. As a cultural product it has quite another set of problems."--specifically to note when I was switching from aesthetics to politics. I guess you should have stopped reading then. Still, I'm not convinced everyone will share your extremely limited notion of what constitutes a movie review.

Comment by Ms. Tek

Sun, 20 Jun 2004 17:30:32 EDT

Well, when I see that a movie review seems to be some sort of political commentary, it turns me off from seeing what the author has to say about the movie. I see enough political shit on tv and in the paper that when I go to the movie, I want to be entertained. I higly doubt that when people made The Day After Tomorrow, they were trying to make some telling political stand: They wanted to make as much money as they can with a disaster flick. Just because it happens to be about global warming doesn't make it a political statement

Comment by Alan Dale

Sun, 20 Jun 2004 17:14:46 EDT

Setting aside the characterization of my comments about liberals as bitching and whining, you seem to make the assumption that what a person writes about a movie has to be categorized either as a movie review or as political commentary, but not both. Why?

Comment by Ms. Tek

Sun, 20 Jun 2004 16:04:33 EDT

*whine*

Comment by Ms. Tek

Sun, 20 Jun 2004 16:04:17 EDT

so was this a movie review or a bitch and wine fest about liberals? Hard to tell.