San Andreas

I've been trying to think of the last big, flashy, blockbustery, disaster film I saw at the cinema. Granted, there have been many disasters of films recently, Willow Creek, American Sniper, and small disaster films like the hilarious Eyjafjallajökull (The Volcano), which, if you haven't seen by now, you're nuts; and the heart-wrenching The Impossible two years ago. But I had to go all the way back to 2009 to the then-prophetic, now-silly, Roland Emmerich film 2012. Jeebus, have I been writing this thing for that long? I gave that one eight out of ten mainly because it looked awesome and Woody Harrelson. Sadly, there is no Woody in this film, but it still looks awesome. However, with that film in mind, this one is very, very familiar.

Before I go on, please consider donating to the Nepal Earthquake fund. Ta much. 

San Andreas was directed by Brad Peyton who also directed Journey 2: The Mysterious Island and Cats & Dogs: The Revenge of Kitty Galore. The screenplay was written by one half of the Holy Darlton: Hallowed Be Thy Name, Carlton Cuse (Lost, Bates Motel). Story by credits go to Andre Fabrizio (Vice) and Jeremy Passmore (Red Dawn). 

Our hero, Ray (Dwayne Johnson - Furious 7) is an actual hero. He's just rescued a young lady from a car accident that resulted in her hanging of the side of a cliff face. Ray is a chopper pilot, just doin' his job. He's about to take a couple of days off to take his daughter Blake (Alexandra Daddario - True Detective) to college. His wife Emma (Carla Gugino - Wayward Pines) has just filed for divorce and is moving in her her new boyfriend, Daniel Riddick (Ioan Gruffudd - Forever). Riddick, get it? Anyway...

 The Rock: Human Tectonic Plate.

Meanwhile over at CalTech, Professor Lawrence (Paul Giamatti - Saving Mr Banks) and his colleague Dr Park (Will Yun Lee - Spy) have just made a significant breakthrough. They have a computer model that can predict when an earthquake will happen - something science is not yet able to do. Unfortunately, they find this out just as the Hoover Dam collapses due to a 7.1 quake in Nevada. Lawrence can tell from their model that the San Andreas Fault is about to have a major renovation.

Ray is called out to help at the damned dam so Daniel offers to take Blake to college in his private jet. How nice. Further south, Los Angeles was just totaled by a 9.1 and SF is the next to get hit.

 It's totally like a metaphoric representation of the wealth gap...

As I said before, much like 2012, this film looks awesome. It is a massive spectacle of the state-of-the-art CGI filmed in 3D - the "D" stands for "Destroy-O-Vision" (trademark pending). I actually saw this one in 3D so that was fun. While 2012 was bi-coastal, San Andreas is, because of the title (duh), confined to the West, although we do hear news reports of stuff happening in the East but no one cares.

The film checks all the boxes on the "Things To Include In A Disaster Film" check list, I'm sure one exists. Damage to the iconic Hollywood sign? Check. Damage to Golden Gate Bridge? Check. Buildings crumbling around someone flying a helicopter/small plane? Check. Stupid people going the wrong way? Check. Someone being a dick? Check. Kylie Minogue... wait, huh? Check.

 This is actually from the film 2012.

There's a whole bunch of coincidences as well which I never like. One or two, sure but not this many. I won't go into details because I'm lazy and I don't want to spoil. Although, if you've seen one of these films, you've seen them all.

Overall, it was an enjoyable film with lots of crumbly goodness and edge-of-your-seat bits but also very predictable. We learn some facts about earthquakes which are both fascinating and scary.

Things I learnt: looters gonna loot; don't move to California; this is why the US needs to keep funding FEMA!

No Woody.
Seven out of ten.