The Day After Tomorrow: SimMovie 2004

The Day After Tomorrow has come, and is one of the Event Movies of summer 2004. A big budget, big cast, big name director, and big ideas demand attention, and the constant hype surrounding the release has ensured a fairly high level of awareness and interest with the movie-going public. An enormous number of people have seen the movie, and its box-office numbers have been near the top of the list since it was released. It’s a success story. There’s something about it all that I don’t understand, though.

I've read several reviews of The Day After Tomorrow in which the movie is put down for clichéd dialogue, over-the-top effects, sketchy science, and an implausible storyline. One reviewer gave it a single star, saying in effect, "Don't waste your time or money." I submit that these people are missing the point. They are reviewing this film like a regular movie. It isn't a regular movie, folks. Don't kid yourself by pretending that it is. It's a disaster movie. That gives it enormous license to exaggerate, to wallow in cliché, and to destroy whatever parts of the world it sees fit to destroy, and anyone who goes into it expecting more is fooling themselves. Lord of the Rings this isn't. Then again, it isn't supposed to be.

What is it supposed to be, then? Well, have you ever played SimCity? One of the classic video games, the goal is to build and grow a city: nurturing it, coddling the populace, giving them what they want, and watching the population and revenue grow over time. Fun, right? Well, sure, but only for so long. Then you start sneaking looks at what choices are listed under the "Disasters" menu. The classic SimCity game progression is to build a city, grow it as successfully as you can, then rain destruction down on the unsuspecting Sim population (well, my population usually knew something was up--my first step was almost always to raze all the fire stations before plunging the city into chaos). Earthquakes, fires, meteor strikes, monster attacks, tornadoes, floods--all the classics were available in SimCity. Most of them are also in The Day After Tomorrow. It’s SimCity come to life.

I remember seeing the trailer for this movie for the first time. My eyes got wide then I just started laughing out loud because I immediately knew what it was going to be like and I couldn't wait to see it. I wasn't even a little bit disappointed when I finally did see it, either. I was highly entertained. Any movie that wipes out Los Angeles, New York, and most of the rest of the Northern Hemisphere is all right by me, especially if there are tornadoes somehow involved. It wasn't the best movie I've ever seen; it wasn't even close (if there had been an alien invasion just as New York flash-froze, maybe, just maybe…). But that's ok. I had no illusion that it would be. That’s not why I was there.

Suspension of disbelief is vital to the success of any movie, but more so with a movie like this. So the science is iffy. So the storyline is a little thin in places. So the dialogue is cheesier than a Wisconsin dairy farm. I can deal. Cliché and cheese are staples in the disaster diet. I’m more than willing to abandon every pretense of disbelief for any movie as long as it’s entertaining, and The Day After Tomorrow provided the entertainment in spades.

If I'm going into the theater looking for a "good" movie, give me The Return of the King. Give me The Shawshank Redemption. Heck, give me the new Harry Potter flick. When I bought my ticket for The Day After Tomorrow, though, I wasn't looking for literary greatness. I was looking for what I got from Armageddon, Independence Day, or any of the other classic disaster movies from the last 30 years. I was looking for two hours plus of loud noises, Nature gone mad, and plucky heroes trying their darnedest to save the day. Roland Emmerich delivered just that, and for what it is, I think The Day After Tomorrow is at the head of its class.

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