The Day After Tomorrow (2004)

Director:

Roland Emmerich

Writers (WGA):

Roland Emmerich (story)
Roland Emmerich (screenplay) ...

Release Date:

28 May 2004 (USA)

Genre:

Action | Adventure | Sci-Fi | Thriller

Tagline:

This year, a sweater won't do.

Plot:

A climatologist tries to figure out a way to save the world from abrupt global warming. He must get to his young son in New York, which is being taken over by a new ice age.

Plot Keywords:

New York | Global Warming | Climatologist | Weather | Disaster

Awards:

Won BAFTA Film Award. Another 3 wins & 8 nominations

Cast

  (Cast overview, first billed only)

Dennis Quaid	...	Jack Hall
Jake Gyllenhaal	...	Sam Hall
Emmy Rossum	...	Laura Chapman
Dash Mihok	...	Jason Evans
Jay O. Sanders	...	Frank Harris
Sela Ward	...	Dr. Lucy Hall
Austin Nichols	...	J.D.
Arjay Smith	...	Brian Parks
Tamlyn Tomita	...	Janet Tokada
Sasha Roiz	...	Parker
Ian Holm	...	Terry Rapson
Nassim Sharara	...	Saudi Delegate
Carl Alacchi	...	Venezuelan Delegate
Kenneth Welsh	...	Vice President Becker
Michel 'Gish' Abou-Samah	...	Saudi Translator (as Michael A. Samah)

Also Known As:

MPAA:

Rated PG-13 for intense situations of peril.

Runtime:

124 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English | French | Japanese | Italian

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

DTS | Dolby Digital | SDDS

Certification:

USA:PG-13 (certificate #40177) | Iceland:L | Brazil:Livre | Malaysia:U | France:U | Argentina:13 | Australia:M | Canada:PG | Chile:TE | Czech Republic:12 | Finland:K-11 | Germany:12 | Ireland:12 | Netherlands:12 | New Zealand:M | Norway:11 | Peru:PT | Philippines:G | Portugal:M/12 | Singapore:PG | South Korea:12 | Sweden:11 | Switzerland:10 (canton of Geneva) | Switzerland:10 (canton of Vaud) | Switzerland:12 (canton of Zurich) | UK:12A | Greece:K-13

Filming Locations:

Canada

Company:

Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation

Trivia:

The whole wolves attacking the ship sequence took only 5 days to film.

Goofs:

Factual errors: In the final shot the space station is moving across the screen with the Earth in the background. Midway through the camera pulls back dramatically and we see the Earth recede into the distance, while the station continues its journey across the screen, changing neither speed nor size. The inference is that the space station has instantaneously moved away from the Earth with a rate of acceleration that would allow it to achieve galactic escape velocity (speeds of over 1000 km/s). The space station should have receded along with the Earth into the distance.

Quotes:

[first lines]
Frank Harris:See how it's done?
Jason Evans:Yeah, I think I got the hang of it.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in The Benchwarmers (2006)

Soundtrack:

Karma

Billions dead, nations destroyed, an insecure dad, young lovers, a cancer patient and a dog.

In Emmerlich's latest end-of-the-world-kinda blockbuster, the disregard our governments and industries have paid to global warming comes to bite us sharply on the rear end - and here there is no Jeff Goldblum and an alien-capable laptop to save us. The aggressor this time is the weather, as global currents shift to recorrect an imbalance, causing catastrophe around the world: it snows in India, turkey-sized hailstones fall in Tokyo, tornados ravage Los Angeles, tidal floods and ice envelop New York City. Obviously these are all places where the producers hope to reap an audience. There is much in The Day After Tomorrow that is interesting and even frightening, but even more is profoundly ridiculous and an insult to even those of mediocre intelligence ... first, I shall deal with the latter.

What frustrates me most about these films are their too-neat narratives that insist in packaging plot between an instructional beginning and a resolution at the end - and this primarily because they somehow have to be character-driven and contain liberal doses of schmaltzy personal guff. So Dennis Quaid feels alienated from his son, and his son can't express his romantic attentions to his female best friend - does Roland think this would *really* be that important if millions of people were freezing to death? Does he really think that's what audiences have come to see? I would guess that nine-tenths of those who handed over their green to see this movie were agog during the destruction, and slouched down in their seats with indifference when the shallow and clichéd character scenes interrupted the action. None of this is new to those who watch CGI Saturday matinee popcorn flicks like this one, but surely there's a director out there that can transcend this nonsense.

I'm not going to quibble with the science used by the film because I know little about climate or meteorology. But what amazes me is how quickly this new Ice Age ascends (here a flashing buoy, there a flashing buoy...) and how short a time it stays with us. Didn't the last one last for centuries at least? It seems more than a little convenient that Emmerlich's chilly spell is so massive and destructive, yet so temporary (it's pretty hard to fight the weather, isn't it, though I wouldn't have been surprised to see Quaid trying). These things all add to the formulaic and uninventive storyline of this movie; it is script-writing by numbers.

That said, it was worth seeing for the half-hour or so of special effects, shocking events and not-so-subtle humour. Cities are devastated and icons are destroyed (a tornado's path fortuitously takes in the length of the Hollywood sign, and the Statue of Liberty takes its umpteenth cinematic battering). People die, but they're not main characters so who cares. A roaming pair of timber wolves are well used in the frozen New York streetscape. And who's to blame for this mess? A Dick Cheney-a-like who scoffs at Quaid's theories, gives short shrift to the environment and cheers on heavy industry (interestly, the rather Bush-like president disappears, leaving power in the VP's hands - more satirical comment perhaps.) If only the film could have taken itself as seriously as it took its political leaders, it could have been a lot better.