Okay... now that we're one week into 2013, I feel comfortable in saying that, we, the human race, made it through 2012... it's official, folks--we're living on borrowed time. To celebrate, I've compiled a list of my favorite end of the world movies... enjoy.
I'm not one for scary movies... but this one makes the cut. In
28 Days Later,
we see a group of activists unknowingly unleash a bunch of monkeys infected
with a genetically altered strain of human emotion called RAGE. Crazy, angry monkeys bite humans, turning them into crazy, angry people who then, bite other people. Interesting that in trying to dull the human experience, those asshats
actually messed stuff up even more...
Moral of the story: If it ain't broke--don't fix it.
2012... We all knew it was a big hoax, right? This movie portrayed a huge
cluster-F of natural disasters. Earthquakes. Fires. Super Storms. Tsunamis... John Cusack fights his way through it all to save his ex-wife and their two children from certain death. We come to find out that government knew this was going t happen all along and contracted the Chinese to build HUGE ships to ensure the survival of the species.
Moral of the story: The Mayans were wrong, bitches!
Armageddon gives us an asteroid the size of Texas, Bruce Willis and
a $300 plastic ice cream scoop. This movie was all about the cinematography (Michael Bay films are filled with stirring images of Americana) and the fact that Bruce Willis dies in order to save the world. I've seen this movie a hundred times and still cry like a baby when Liv Tyler finally realizes her father isn't coming home.
Moral of the story: Promises are made to be broken.
Children of Men gives us nearly 20 years of human infertility, a world on the brink of collapse and Clive Owen as the cynical escort to the only woman to become pregnant is over 18 years. This movie paints a bleak picture--police states, civil war and refugee camps. A disaffected government and a hopeless public fight each other for their own version of humanity.
Moral of the story: Whitney was right: Children really
are the future.
The Day After Tomorrow... Dennis Quaid as a Climatologist
(is that even a real thing?) warns the government of an the catastrophic
effects of global warming and the resulting 2nd Ice Age cometh. Jake
Gyllenhaal plays his dutiful son who holes up in a New York city library
and burns books to wait it out. In a strange twist, the only habitable place in Northern America is Mexico and Americans bum rush the boarders much to the dismay of our Southern neighbors. We are granted asylum by the Mexican
government in return for the forgiveness of their country's debts to
the U.S..
Moral of the story: If you hold out long enough, eventually you
won't have to pay up.
Okay, okay... I know what you're thinking:
Deep Impact and
Armageddon are the same movie. You're right, they pretty much
are the same movie--but I have to admit that out of the two, I like
this one more. Why? Because it was more realistic, for one. I think
we all know that an asteroids cannot be drilled upon and nuked
by a bunch of Roughnecks. Deep Impact gave us the human
experience... and Morgan Freeman as president.
Moral of the story: When your mother hands you a baby
and tells you to run, don't argue--just do it. (See above).
I am Legend is one of those rare movies I actually like more than the
book... and I use the term "book" lightly here. It was more like a short
story and is was... well, it was boring. I did appreciate the fact that the
pandemic (Matheson never says for sure what it was, but the afflicted
sounded a lot like vampires to me) that sweeps across the
planet claims everyone but Neville... who is finally captured and
executed because he is trying to cure everyone. He in turn, has become
the threat and they kill him for being different. The movie moves along
the same lines, but Neville finds a cure and sacrifices himself to ensure
that it reaches the last outpost of civilization and in effect, saves
humanity. I like that Will Smith is half nutty in the movie and I cried
when he had to kill his dog... but I always cry when the dog buys it.
Moral of the story: Never trust a mannequin named Fred.
My favorite Mad Max movie is
Thunder Dome (yes, it's because of Tina Turner) but the film that kicks off this franchise is a close second.
Mad Max gives us a look at what will happen in Australia if the world ever runs out of oil. Crazed motorcycle gangs will rule the highways, raping and killing for fuel. Policemen will turn vigilante and kangaroos will become extinct (it must be true, because I didn't see any in the movie).
Moral of the story: Never piss off a guy named Max.
I loved this movie as a kid... that's the only reason it's here.
Night of the Comet is a campy B-flick about how the tail of a
comet passes over earth and turns everyone to dust... and those
who survive into flesh-eating zombies (like there's any other
kind...). Two sisters survive--each had inadvertently been
shielded from the effects of the comet by spending the night in
steel lined structures and are left to fend off said zombies,
and government clean-up and whack-a-doo scientists while
lamenting over the death of so many cute boys!
Moral of the story: When given the option, always opt for
MMA classes over piano--a round-house kick is so much more
helpful during the Apocalypse than knowing how to play Heart
and Soul.
Okay--confession time... this movie scared the absolute shit out of me .
The Happening starts when a bunch of people start randomly killing themselves--and each other--for seemingly no reason at all. Mark Wahlberg uses the power of his third nipple (he has a 3rd nipple--you can see it clearly in the scene from
Shooter where he's laid up in Kate Mara's house waiting for her to pull a couple of bullets out of his belly) to determine that the trees are trying to kill us. I looked this up and there is scientific evidence that supports the theory that trees can communicate with each other and that they are capable of releasing a nerve toxin that can make us all crazy if and when they decide to perceive us as a threat.
Moral of the story: Recycle.
The good news in
The Road, is that all those homicidal trees are dead. The bad news is, so is everything else.
This is one horrible, bleak,
what's the point, we're all gonna die anyway movie. Early on, we see Mother give birth at home, aided by her husband, shortly after some cataclysmic event caused society to implode. Mother, driven crazy by despair commits suicide shortly after giving birth. Man takes Boy and hits the road... and is set upon by cannibals... and more cannibals... and more--well you get the picture. Man dies in the end and leaves Boy alone. Boy is found by Family who has been following Man and Boy for a while because they were worried about Boy and the fact that every time shit went sideways (which was every 5 minutes), Man's solution was to kill Boy and then himself, but could never seem to pull it off.
Moral of the story: Buy bullets in bulk.
