Weekend Movie Forecast: 2012 Vs. Fantastic Mr. Fox

At a media screening for 2012 earlier this week, the peals of derisive laughter erupting from the assorted hacks grew increasingly more raucous as the vast destruction was actually overshadowed by the corniness wafting from the dialogue and plot. But what did the critics really expect—dazzling sophistication and dry wit? This is a Roland Emmerich movie, set mostly in the titular year, when neutrinos from the sun melt the Earth's core, causing widespread catastrophe. But fortunately for the movie's elites, scientists alerted the government in enough time for an international alliance to come up with an escape plan—which protagonist John Cusak must weasel into with his family before they ignominiously die alongside billions of loser non-celebrities.

This is the mother of all disaster movies, and it's about as good as you'd expect, provided you only expect a reasonably well-structured spectacle packed with tension and release and a little bit of Hollywood "heart." Woody Harrelson, whom we'd follow into hell, brings a daffy comic touch to the role of the tinfoil-hat radio host who saw the whole thing coming. Danny Glover may be flat and bored as the last president of the United States, but [spoiler!] he's got a great death scene on the White House lawn. Oliver Platt is reliably brilliant, and Cusak, as usual, is fun to watch as he contemptuously picks up his fat paycheck. But the real stars here are the forces of nature that literally destroy everything on earth, and it's a strange feeling to be mildly entertained while watching images of our species' demise. (John Del Signore)