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The Day After Tomorrow is a paen to mankind’s stupidity.  At least, his stupidity in the 21st century.  The coming of a new ice age as a result of global warming and the rise of coal and petroleum  use in industry.  The causes of previous ice ages are not mentioned, but surely it took our prehistoric ancestors much longer to produce enough  excess heat for an ice age to occur.

The resemblance between Roland Emmerich’s Independence Day and Roland Emmerich's  The Day After Tomorrow is remarkable.  Substitute rapid global warming for invading aliens, Dennis Quaid (a scientist seeking his son) for Will Smith (a pilot seeking his wife and child), friends of Quaid who might as well paint targets on their backs for friends of Smith who might as well have painted targets on their backs, add the president of the U.S. escaping D.C. (Bill Pullman in Day and Perry King in Day --and have you noticed by now that both films have “day” in the title?), use masterful special effects (New York’s fiery destruction and L.A., too, vs. New York freezing and Los Angeles tornados) and cap it off with the traditional evacuation of the city, and there is nothing new under Emmerich's sun. 

The Day After Tomorrow begins with Quaid as a climatologist drilling core samples in the ozen north.  The ice ledges are breaking so after a harrowing escape with fellow scientists, other scientists start to pick up strange happenings such as Ian Holm in Scotland noticing a 13-degree rise in water temperature within hours.  What does this mean? Quaid knows a disaster is forming and it overtakes the United States faster than can be imagined amid a weave of subplots of young love, survival against all odds, escaped wolves, a homeless man with his pet dog and the Guttenberg Bible, The Day After Tomorrow manages insipid dialogue and ridiculous situations.  It’s 150 degrees outside and men have no face covering and take their gloves off?  Photojournalists are broadcasting in tornado-velocity weather (with power down who is watching?),and somehow there is gas heat in the frozen city. When people tie themselves together to keep from getting lost, you know there is trouble ahead. The southern part of the U.S. is evacuated and Mexico won’t accept people because Americans are now illegal aliens. Quaid and Sela Ward play the parents of Jake Gyllenhaal, and Quaid just can’t seem to keep the distant look out of his eyes, as though he is already on his next adventure.  Sela Ward doesn’t play the part of mom very well, so it is up to Jake to carry the film and that he does very well, given the dialogue he has to speak.  Jake and Ian Holm are the bright spots of the movie. There are humorous throwaway lines, such as trying to decide which books to burn for warmth, “well, the tax books could go first.”  The street man and his pet dog are always good for a chuckle.  

The Day After Tomorrow could have played as a silent film.  Audiences would have gotten the idea quite well because the special effects rule the day here.  Scenes of New York City swamped by water and then frozen over are stunning but I could have done without the wolves running wild in the city.  Enough, already.  

Massive tornado’s over Los Angeles are great to watch and the reactions to all of these horrible weather situations being observed by men in Skylab, who can do nothing but watch helplessly are interesting but do they ever get down?  Who knows?  Perhaps we'll find out in a sequel, whose title I think should be The Week After Next.  Sorry, I’ll be at another film.

Copyright 2004 Marie Asner
Submitted 6/5/04