Delayed Reaction: San Andreas

The Pitch: The Rock fights an Earthquake

A super earthquake along the San Andreas fault decimates California.

I don't think I can come up with the difference between a good and a bad disaster movie. The effects are certainly key to it. Independence Day doesn't become a massive hit without that White House explosion. I certainly like when filmmakers get a little adventurous with the idea, like Cloverfield's found footage angle. Something like Gravity has enough prestige trappings to make people forget that it really is just a disaster movie in space. But if you look at the real disaster movies, I can't say why I have different opinions about Poseidon (bad), The Day After Tomorrow (silly and forgettable), Twister (a fine movie), and ID4 (a classic of American cinema). [Note: I really want to stress the word "opinion" there] Disaster movies aren't something I seek out. Too much of the movies are in the pitch. Sometimes, they are the perfect thing to watch though.

Let me set the scene. It's a Saturday morning that's bled into a Saturday afternoon. I had a little too much to drink the night before. I wouldn't use the word 'hungover', but I was definitely in a state where taking on the world did not sound appealing. I've already gone through a bunch of 30 Rock episodes. I'm not in the mood to move onto the next new show on my big list. All the movies on my streaming lists require something out of me like attention or critical thought. So I start surfing through all the recordings on my YouTube TV (I still don't know how this service works. It will record things seemingly at random). That's when I see San Andreas. I need to get to this movie eventually. I believe it's the highest grossing live-action movie that I haven't seen (which says more about how many blockbusters I've seen than how high it is on the list). It has some people I like. Dwayne Johnson has completely won me over by now. Alexandra Daddario is perpetually on the verge of becoming someone I really like. So I decide to watch it.

I couldn't've been a more receptive audience at the time. Because of that, I had a blast watching this.

The movie starts with a woman who gets in a car accident, and it's shot like a Final Destination movie. Right away, I know that this movie wants to play. That's followed by a stupidly dangerous helicopter rescue of the woman that's there to tell us this isn't one of those movies where I have to pretend that Dwayne Johnson is some regular guy. No, he's The Rock, and he's ready to lay the smack down on a mountain if that's what the situation requires.

Eventually, when the earthquakes start, the  movie breaks into three stories. The A-story is Johnson rescuing his ex-wife (Carla Gugino)* from downtown L.A while skyscrapers are crashing around his helicopter. They then move by helicopter, car, plane, and boat to San Francisco to save their daughter (Daddario). I could quibble about the math not really working out for Daddario to be their daughter, but I just don't care.

*Side note: It's weirdly refreshing how age appropriate Johnson's love interests are in his movies. Gugino is a year older than him. Neve Campbell (Skyscraper) is a year younger than him. Naomie Harris (Rampage) is four years younger. The rest of the time, he doesn't seem to bother with a love interest. Given how guys like Tom Cruise regularly have 15+ year age gaps in there movies (he's 21 years older than Sarah Wright who played his wife in American Made), that feels noteworthy.

The B-story is Daddario and her British love interest (and his little brother) surviving the madness in San Francisco. The most notable thing about this is that they do the role reversal of making her the action hero. Apparently, despite seeming pretty basic when she's first introduced, she's learned all the survival skills she'll ever need from her father. This would be a good place to note that Gugino's CEO boyfriend reveals himself to be a total villain when the earthquakes start. Disaster movies don't really need villains (unless someone is somehow causing the earthquakes - They're not), but they included one anyway. Despite the amount of debris falling everywhere around them, everyone has a surprising lack of small cuts and bruises. Don't worry. The british future boyfriend does get a strategic leg injury at one point that's occasionally ignored.

The C-story involves Paul Giamatti and Archie Punjabi as a seismologist and a reporter interviewing him at the time the earthquakes begin. This story is 90% exposition and can be found in nearly every disaster movie. I didn't need it, except that I loved every second of Giamatti running around trying to look even more surprised each time he reads the Richter scale measure of the latest earthquake.

The movie isn't very good. The earthquake effects are fine, I guess. The story is rubbish. More importantly, the number of lucky breaks that every character gets (the number of times an extra gets crushed by debris while standing next to a named character who is unscathed) is ridiculous. The actors try to make it all feel real. I can't say why I liked this significantly more than, say, 2012. I just did.

Verdict (?): Weakly Recommend