Letter from the Movie "The Day After Tomorrow"
I am really happy with the way I came out, and let me unabashedly and at great length tell you why. First of all, how many "disaster movies" do you see that ultimately carry a message of humbleness and hope? Who else can straddle the bright golden line that exists between high concept drama and overlong destructionist fantasy? Not many! "Volcano"? The coast was toast but Los Angelino's simply carried on with their normal lives after the volcano quit erupting. (After only one night! How many actual volcanoes do that? It took me two whole weeks just to destroy the northern hemisphere!) "Twister"? Some crackers and Cary Elwes take the long nap, but otherwise it's totally meh. "The Core"? They saved the world but Hilary Swank remained fully-clothed! "Dante's Peak"? I don't even remember that one! "Independence Day"? Pffff. I'm not a racist, but who honestly believes a black man and a Jew can save the world? Hey, I'm just telling it like it is. It's society that's sick, not me.
No, seriously, I'm so not a racist. Here, fast forward to scene 4 where the black guy in Scotland kisses his white wife goodbye. I fought for that scene, really I did. The suits, they wanted to cut it because they said the scene made no sense, but I fought for it. And now you can see that whole scene intact, glorious and free as it should be! Granted, this is the first and last time we see his wife and baby before we send her "to Spain" and leave him to die slowly in the cold over the course of the film, giving his character two more scenes but still adding absolutely nothing to his persona or backstory and subsequently abandoning him to die in the cold without even a reaction shot of his face. But at least his white wife survived! And their interracial child! That says something. Love is love no matter what your color and nothing can come between that except a new ice age.
Some people say it doesn't count because I didn't have the guts to make the interracial couple Americans, where race is actually an issue, but I think I had enough going on in America, thank you very much! The rest of the movie's entire cast is there! I already had people there, stationed in major cities as convenient plot devices. Also I had a black dude there, too. Remember? He represented the homeless!
Don't ask how his dog mysteriously disappeared after the new ice age set in! Man, the focus groups hated that scene. But I fought for that one, too. There was so much truth in it, you know? But I had to cut it. It's still sort of there, though. If you look closely in the beginning of scene 25 you can see one of the background people picking something out of their teeth.
I'll tell you what the focus groups didn't mind, though. The destruction of New York City by tidal floods so soon after 9/11. I was really prepared to go to bat for that and explain our artistic reasons behind it. It was symbolism! Also we really wanted the radical natural reaction of the ecosystem to inspire some primal terror in people. If we couldn't explain that they should stop their current ignorant attitude towards the world, then we should scare them into stopping. And what better way to terrorize people than toppling the seemingly invincible island of Manhattan? None, I tell you! I mean, what would you feel if you saw an unstoppable kinetic force barrelling towards you? You'd get on your knees and pray to survive, that's what! You know you'd have no hope against that wall as it crashed into you with the tenacity of a madman.
But, like I said, our focus groups in L.A. actually cheered at this part, so we kept the whole thing in.
I was really pleased with the love story between Jake Gyllenhaal and his female debate team friend. You just knew as soon as you saw them that they would end up together at the end of the film. I mean, the airplane, the sudden gripping of her hand in fear! Very Bogart and Bergman. Classic. Did you see the big doe eyes she was making at him the whole time? I certainly did. Even when she was briefly given a tour by that guy on the other debate team that she thought was cute, I just knew that the guy would end up doing the noble thing in the very next scene and let the lead man in the film go for the girl. Sometimes I wonder what might have happened if the new ice age hadn't come on them at that moment. She might have gone with the guy she was attracted to instead of the guy she who's ego she had to constantly massage and prop up.
She was a great actress. I forget her name. Great actress.
Speaking of great actresses, I was so moved by Randy Quaid's wife and her arc with the cancer-stricken kid who she refuses to abandon in the two hours between when the power goes out and the ambulances come to pick them up. I can't believe those ambulances drove through all that snow to get them! That must have been a heck of a struggle through the blinding blizzard and dropping temperatures. What perserverance those EMT's must have had! I wish we could have showed their story, or seen something other than their ambulance's headlights shining in the window, but I didn't want to lose a drop of the story between the doctor and the realistically thin cancer child. Not a single drop.
Gosh, listen to me! Going on and on about the characters in this movie when you want to know about the science and special effects! I'm sorry, I just couldn't help it, you know? I've grown so attached to these characters and their stories that I wish I could somehow put them through another ice age so I could see them grow a smidgen more.
Oh, but before I go any further, I should address the scene at the New Delhi environmental conference. I know the Mid-Atlantic ocean current in the presentation, the centerpiece of the entire theory behind the oncoming ice age and thus the movie, is flowing the incorrect way in the diagram. The thing is, you weren't supposed to actually notice that huge mistake. We sure cut away quickly enough! I'm flattered you were paying that close attention to me, but really you should have been looking at Randy Quaid and taking his warnings to heart. Or, if not that, then wondering why the actor playing the Vice President looks exactly like Dick Cheney while the actor playing the President doesn't look at all like George W. Bush. No one reported on that, did they?
No, I don't know what a troposphere is, either. I just know we needed a way to make people freeze instantly. I thought that was neat. Air from the edge of space, of course that would be ice cold! I sure had some creative writers!
I could go on forever about how awesome I am, but I should wrap it up. I leave you with these words. Watch me with a light and joyous heart, because in the end I'm just a movie and if you watch me too closely then I'll just fall apart on you. At the same time, take me exceedingly seriously, more seriously than you've taken anything else, because what I depict could actually happen within your lifetime. Then you'll wish you had suffered through my plotholes and listened to me.
You'll be sorry.
No, seriously, I'm so not a racist. Here, fast forward to scene 4 where the black guy in Scotland kisses his white wife goodbye. I fought for that scene, really I did. The suits, they wanted to cut it because they said the scene made no sense, but I fought for it. And now you can see that whole scene intact, glorious and free as it should be! Granted, this is the first and last time we see his wife and baby before we send her "to Spain" and leave him to die slowly in the cold over the course of the film, giving his character two more scenes but still adding absolutely nothing to his persona or backstory and subsequently abandoning him to die in the cold without even a reaction shot of his face. But at least his white wife survived! And their interracial child! That says something. Love is love no matter what your color and nothing can come between that except a new ice age.
Some people say it doesn't count because I didn't have the guts to make the interracial couple Americans, where race is actually an issue, but I think I had enough going on in America, thank you very much! The rest of the movie's entire cast is there! I already had people there, stationed in major cities as convenient plot devices. Also I had a black dude there, too. Remember? He represented the homeless!
Don't ask how his dog mysteriously disappeared after the new ice age set in! Man, the focus groups hated that scene. But I fought for that one, too. There was so much truth in it, you know? But I had to cut it. It's still sort of there, though. If you look closely in the beginning of scene 25 you can see one of the background people picking something out of their teeth.
I'll tell you what the focus groups didn't mind, though. The destruction of New York City by tidal floods so soon after 9/11. I was really prepared to go to bat for that and explain our artistic reasons behind it. It was symbolism! Also we really wanted the radical natural reaction of the ecosystem to inspire some primal terror in people. If we couldn't explain that they should stop their current ignorant attitude towards the world, then we should scare them into stopping. And what better way to terrorize people than toppling the seemingly invincible island of Manhattan? None, I tell you! I mean, what would you feel if you saw an unstoppable kinetic force barrelling towards you? You'd get on your knees and pray to survive, that's what! You know you'd have no hope against that wall as it crashed into you with the tenacity of a madman.
But, like I said, our focus groups in L.A. actually cheered at this part, so we kept the whole thing in.
I was really pleased with the love story between Jake Gyllenhaal and his female debate team friend. You just knew as soon as you saw them that they would end up together at the end of the film. I mean, the airplane, the sudden gripping of her hand in fear! Very Bogart and Bergman. Classic. Did you see the big doe eyes she was making at him the whole time? I certainly did. Even when she was briefly given a tour by that guy on the other debate team that she thought was cute, I just knew that the guy would end up doing the noble thing in the very next scene and let the lead man in the film go for the girl. Sometimes I wonder what might have happened if the new ice age hadn't come on them at that moment. She might have gone with the guy she was attracted to instead of the guy she who's ego she had to constantly massage and prop up.
She was a great actress. I forget her name. Great actress.
Speaking of great actresses, I was so moved by Randy Quaid's wife and her arc with the cancer-stricken kid who she refuses to abandon in the two hours between when the power goes out and the ambulances come to pick them up. I can't believe those ambulances drove through all that snow to get them! That must have been a heck of a struggle through the blinding blizzard and dropping temperatures. What perserverance those EMT's must have had! I wish we could have showed their story, or seen something other than their ambulance's headlights shining in the window, but I didn't want to lose a drop of the story between the doctor and the realistically thin cancer child. Not a single drop.
Gosh, listen to me! Going on and on about the characters in this movie when you want to know about the science and special effects! I'm sorry, I just couldn't help it, you know? I've grown so attached to these characters and their stories that I wish I could somehow put them through another ice age so I could see them grow a smidgen more.
Oh, but before I go any further, I should address the scene at the New Delhi environmental conference. I know the Mid-Atlantic ocean current in the presentation, the centerpiece of the entire theory behind the oncoming ice age and thus the movie, is flowing the incorrect way in the diagram. The thing is, you weren't supposed to actually notice that huge mistake. We sure cut away quickly enough! I'm flattered you were paying that close attention to me, but really you should have been looking at Randy Quaid and taking his warnings to heart. Or, if not that, then wondering why the actor playing the Vice President looks exactly like Dick Cheney while the actor playing the President doesn't look at all like George W. Bush. No one reported on that, did they?
No, I don't know what a troposphere is, either. I just know we needed a way to make people freeze instantly. I thought that was neat. Air from the edge of space, of course that would be ice cold! I sure had some creative writers!
I could go on forever about how awesome I am, but I should wrap it up. I leave you with these words. Watch me with a light and joyous heart, because in the end I'm just a movie and if you watch me too closely then I'll just fall apart on you. At the same time, take me exceedingly seriously, more seriously than you've taken anything else, because what I depict could actually happen within your lifetime. Then you'll wish you had suffered through my plotholes and listened to me.
You'll be sorry.
posted by greenland at 6:27 PM
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