Pun Salad

Not just a stupid movie, it's a movie that assumes that you're stupid.

The culprit is solar neutrinos. No, really. The sun pumps those out all the time, and usually nearly all of them pass through you, me, and the entire planet without raising any more fuss than a John Updike poem.

Unfortunately, in 2012, something has turned the solar neutrinos badass. And they party down in our planetary nether regions, causing increased seismic activity, vulcanism, and massive tsunamis as the crust becomes uncoupled from the molten core. Or something. And the Mayans predicted that.

We are shown how this impacts a broken L. A. family: John Cusack as the ex-husband of Amanda Peet, who's currently being wooed by Thomas McCarthy. There are also irritating kids. On a separate plot track there are Good Scientists (Chiwetel Ejiofor and Thandie Newton), Evil Politicians (Oliver Platt), and a noble President (Danny Glover). And Woody Harrelson plays a loon with a radio show.

But the real point of the movie is destruction porn, showing the ever more violent death throes of Mother Earth. Cusack's family narrowly escapes death about every five minutes or so, which is an excuse to show (without gory detail, which would detract from the "fun") the demise of nearly everyone else.

Way too long, and stupid all the way through. The filmmakers apparently think you're watching it solely for the PG-13 carnage, to which they only have to add flimsy characters and clichéd plotting. Extra half star for Woody Harrelson and the special effects.