Overall, I was pretty impressed. Although I had heard decent things about it (and it can't be terrible if Dwayne Johnson is in it) it was still a big budget disaster type movie. And I think that those can be hit or miss. But it turned out to be pretty decent.
I had one quibble early on though. When the first meet Paul Giamatti's character (he's a seismologist) he is giving a lecture about earthquakes to students at CalTech. I couldn't help but notice that behind him on the chalkboard is a seriously complex looking math equation (s?). The type of equation where there are weird symbols that make it look like some weird alien language.
But the lecture he's giving is basically "earthquakes cause damage." He's showing the students footage from some of history's biggest earthquakes. One of the students asks him if something "that intense" could happen here and he tells her about the San Andreas fault.
Now I get it that the average movie watcher is not a seismologist. I get that most people probably don't have any knowledge about some large historical earthquakes. (I'm one of them.) As I'm not originally from the west coast, I can also understand that there are plenty of Americans who don't know about the San Andreas fault. (Not to mention the fact that movies are made for world-wide audiences now, and I doubt they teach much about American geology (? geography?) in international schools.
But this character was giving a lecture to college students in LA. I GUARANTEE that they know a large earthquake could happen in Southern California. And these are not just any college students. They're in a fucking earthquake class! How did this student get into CalTech and not know that a large earthquake could happen in Southern California? I mean, even if it's the first day of class. And it seems unlikely that it's the first day of class because of that math on the board. They don't leave that up all summer. Although, if Giammatti's character had written it, he'd be covered in chalk dust so maybe he didn't write it up there now.
I know exactly what the purpose of the scene was. I know that they had to show us that historically, what they are about to show us is not totally unrealistic. But why didn't they have him speak to a bunch of donors or something? In the movie Giamatti is working on a way to predict earthquakes. Have him give this speech at a luncheon for politicians. (Although I would hope that So Cal politicians would also know about the San Andreas.)
Anyways, this occurs fairly early in the movie so I was all set for a hokey disaster movie. But I was mistaken. The action is intense. So much so that at one point, I caught myself thinking "I should call my friends back in California to make sure they're okay." (Hey, it was early in the morning.)
It was also interesting to see the movie turn a disaster movie trope on it's head and have the "damsel in distress" actually be the guy. The main heroine of the movie is a female who, after initially being saved by a cute guy (and his little brother) leads the trio through a destroyed San Francisco. At the end, Johnson's character thanks the brothers for being there for his daughter. The brother says "You're welcome. But it was more like she was there for us." That was a little obvious for me, but a nice touch to point it out to viewers who had maybe missed. it.
Overall, a pretty good movie. Nothing that's going on my list of greatest movies, and I probably won't flag it as a re-watchable movie, but it kept me entertained for almost two hours. And that's all I ask really.
