2012 by Roland Emmerich

[Adaryn]

I just learnt about this movie, scheduled for summer 2009 :

http://www.moviefone.com/movie/2012/30165/hd/480

There's not much info yet, apart from the general idea : "Chronicles the end of human civilization as predicted by the Mayan calendar."

Back in February, blockbuster director Roland Emmerich revealed that his next big movie would be one titled 2012, a disaster movie that takes place in the year of the title. Emmerich's next finished movie is actually 10,000 B.C., which hits theaters this coming Friday. Our friend Steve from Collider caught up with Emmerich last weekend while he was promoting 10,000 B.C. and tried to get him to reveal what exactly happens in 2012, but still had no luck - he's keeping a very tight lip. But if you're interested in trying to guess what it might be or just want to know exactly what Emmerich said, read on. And considering this is the next big $200 million epic summer blockbuster, we're sure you'll want to know.

The script for 2012 is apparently so good, that the studios started a bidding war for distribution, with Sony ending up the winner. Now it's heading into production for a July 10th, 2009 opening. Emmerich has said previously that "it will be very expensive, you see the whole world go to shit" and other sources reported that the "project has more going for it than the big idea that studios love," but what exactly that means yet, no one knows. All that we do know is that 2012 is the year that the Mayan calendar (pictured to the right) ends and many others have predicted that it will be the apocalyptic end of the Earth. What Emmerich is depicting, however, is a "natural disaster" of some sorts.

Before we get into the juicy details, Emmerich explains his inspiration for the movie, and how he convinced himself, after saying he'd never do another disaster movie, to do 2012.

"…This whole movie I'm doing next was inspired by just the phenomenon of the internet when you type in Google, '2012', you get 240 million hits. That's a lot. And it's just, so many people write about it, believe it, that our world comes to an end in 2012. I said wow. I kind of said before I will never do a disaster movie again. I said, for this idea I have to do it again."
When Collider asked Emmerich whether this would achieve a new level of "blowing things up", Emmerich responded with "it's not blowing up, it's something else." And when prodded further to explain himself, Emmerich almost gave it away: "This time there's no blowing up. It's a natural disaster. Well, actually yeah, like a… I'm not saying it! I'm giving things away." Damn, too close! If only he just finished his sentence…

To be honest, Emmerich has done such a great job of teasing 2012, that I'm getting into it almost as much as Cloverfield, where it's become all about figuring out "what it is" more than anything else. Unfortunately we'll have to wait until we see the first teaser trailer or hear reports from the set to get to that point. Emmerich goes on talking to Collider about how "undoable" this is, especially considering they're going to, basically, destroy the entire world. Check out what he had to say!

"Yes, it will be very expensive, but I think it will be for a price because people who read the script said this is undoable. And I said, well but we'll do it. I mean, it's one of these things that everybody says it's undoable because it's like, you see the whole world go to shit… It's kind of one of these things when I write a script, and I wrote it again with Harald [Kloser] together, we just said no, we'll not think if it's doable or not, we'll just write it. We'll just come up with it. And then we'll figure out how we'll do it. I think it's worth doing it because it's also when you have something where you have adrenaline because you are nervous about it, that's good. That's a little bit like… it's good when actors have this adrenaline when they go on stage. I think they do their best work, and for us it's the same thing…"
I love the way he thinks - don't write it with "is it doable?" in mind, just write it, and then figure out how to do it. And even be nervous about it, challenge yourself - that's awesome. As much as we all know that Emmerich is a filmmaker who writes/directs films that are nothing but storyless blockbusters, at least they're entertaining. And although I'm not that excited for 10,000 B.C., I'm already very excited for 2012. I'm really wondering what the hell is going to happen, and how the entire world is going to get destroyed! This should be fun!

Any guesses as to what kind(s) of natural disaster(s) will be destroying the Earth in 2012?

So, any idea here? :P

 

[Third_Density_Resident]

Well it looks interesting. While watching the trailer, I was reminded of Velikovsky's recounting of anecdotes which described "tides piled up as high as mountains". And this supposedly occurred due to the passage of Venus -- its enormous gravitational pull on Earth's oceans created REAL "tidal waves" that we can't even comprehend. I'm a little disappointed though that this film is seemingly only about "natural disasters". It would have been nice if they could have introduced higher dimensional things. So a macrocosmic collapse or two wouldn't have gone astray.

However, the words in the trailer

How would the governments of our planet prepare 6 billion people for the end of the world? They wouldn't. Find out the truth.

could possibly imply that in the film, the governments aren't going to tell the people about it. Then again it is more likely to mean that it would be an impossible task to carry out.

 

[DJM]

The special effects look spectacular. I look forward to watching it.

 

[Bernhard]

However, the words in the trailer

How would the governments of our planet prepare 6 billion people for the end of the world? They wouldn't. Find out the truth.

could possibly imply that in the film, the governments aren't going to tell the people about it. Then again it is more likely to mean that it would be an impossible task to carry out.

Well, what I found even more interesting is what is written at the end of the trailer:

Find out the truth. Google: 2012

Well, good luck on that google search with probably 99% being being highly questionable information.
At this point the whole 2012 theme is a great money maker. More and more books are coming out with 2012 in the title an as we can see the movie industry is milking that cash cow as well.

Here's the trailer:

_http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eGMOlAtNKXI

 

[Alana]

I just learnt about this movie, scheduled for summer 2009 :

http://www.moviefone.com/movie/2012/30165/hd/480

There's not much info yet, apart from the general idea : "Chronicles the end of human civilization as predicted by the Mayan calendar."

Prayers, i can't watch the Quicktime version of the link above, but i found this also after watching Bernhard's youtube link:

-http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gVi_2lHBVhQ&NR=1

which gives some more info, and includes in the things to come towards the End, the return of the "shining ones who will save us all".

More hollywood-made fearmongering and brainwashing?

 

[Adaryn]

Hi Smaragde,

Prayers, i can't watch the Quicktime version of the link above, but i found this also after watching Bernhard's youtube link:

Sorry for that. Actually it was the official trailer, the same as Bernhard posted. All the other ones are fake trailers made by Internet users, like the (scary indeed) one you posted ;). According to Emmerich, the movie is about a natural catastrophy, but I don't know if it'll also include aliens. So far there has been no echo of it... :/

 

[webglider]

I started watching a lot of clips related to 2012 after I found Emmerich's trailer. I found this one interesting: it's about the planet Nibiru.

2012 Mayan Doomsday Prediction
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j1RRPlyGTPg&feature=related

In the clip, there is a part that connects human behavior with catastrophe. It seemed to resonate with some of Laura's teachings that the catastrophe is connected to "The human experiential cycle".

 

[Z...]

Seems Hollywood is generating hype regarding 2012, has anyone seen this one
2012 The War for Souls?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0msH3FBXexs&feature=related

Any good?

 

[Bernhard]

Seems Hollywood is generating hype regarding 2012, has anyone seen this one
2012 The War for Souls?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0msH3FBXexs&feature=related

Any good?

I think that's a fake trailer which doesn't actually contain footage of the movie, a "fan-made" trailer.

The film is still in production and won't be out until 2010. It is based on a novel by Whitley Strieber, so most likely expect some Gray/Lizzie "programming" there.
I remember a session of the C's stating that the film "Wolven", also based on a novel by Strieber, portrays the "Lizzie perspective". Can't find the exact quote.

from _http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/183560/michael_bay_to_direct_2012_the_war.html?cat=40

The creative team behind the upcoming summer movie "Transformers" are reuniting to bring sci-fi author Whitley Strieber's upcoming novel "2012: The War for Souls" to movie screens for Warner Bros. Pictures.

Director Michael Bay and writers Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman are in preliminary talks to bring the novel to the big screen. Michael Bay will direct while Orci and Kurtzman with their company Kurtzman/Orci will produce.

The novel "2012: The War for Souls'" story revolves around an academic researcher who discovers that there are multiple copies of the Earth that co-exist in different dimensions. All of the versions of Earth are threatened by an apocalypse that is to occur in 2012. 2012 is the date of an apocalypse prophesized in the ancient Mayan calendar.

The researcher makes contact with another version of himself on another Earth by opening a portal into a parallel universe. He contacts the double to try and stop the prophecy from being fulfilled.

 

[Erna]

The film has an official website now:

_http://www.sonypictures.com/movies/2012/

It's scheduled for release in November 2009. I also find the trailer quite impressive ... and scary.

The one link at the bottom of the homepage (Institute For Human Continuity) looks like it's aimed at some serious fear mongering, speaking of floating cities and even a lottery where you can fill in your details and stand a chance for a place in their "survival" projects...

Another thing a little unrelated to the film which I noticed today is all the Mayan temples on 2advanced's website interface (_www.2advanced.com) which we've admired for years now, and always lingered there for inspiration. I've always considered Eric Jordan as one of the best Flash gurus out there, and was surprised today that he's obviously very into the 2012 phenomenon.

On his music website (_www.neverrain.com) I see he did a mix which he called "2012" where he states:

This month I bring you a set with such complexity that it defies any genre, which is always my goal. This set brings everything from progressive house, to breaks, to trance, to orchestral ambience. It is an artistic journey to a threshold of events that I think will occur in the year 2012. I prefer not to preach my ideas about what I believe will happen in 2012, but I do wish to explore it through audio as an artist. As a researcher of the Mayan calendar system, the "I-ching", and other timekeeping methods of ancient civilizations, I can only state that I believe something profound will happen in the year 2012. Despite numerous claims that the world will end in 2012, I choose to believe that something far more profound will happen....and this is my "auditory painting" of that event (For a visual exploration of my interpretation of 2012, please refer to the paintings that exist at 2advanced.com). Let your imagination interpret what it will, and enjoy the sounds.

If he's music is anything like his Flash, then it'll be pretty special. I also wonder if 2advanced didn't create the "Institute For Human Continuity" website, cause that's very much their style.

 

[Woodsman]

Well. . , this film is brought to us by the same people who made. . .

Stargate
Godzilla
Independence Day
And "The Day After Tomorrow"

I found all of these to be monumentally dumb films which nonetheless were based on real concerns and interesting ideas. (Well, I didn't bother with Godzilla, so I don't really know about that one.) --They also resonated well with the public who I think are not-so-subconsciously intrigued by these ideas which, after all, stem from key issues on our planet. Fiction is one of the only 'safe' places where people are allowed to explore important concepts without being ridiculed for it.

But. . ,

The films are just SO dumbed down and full of faulty ideas. Part of me thinks, "Disinfo" and part of me thinks, "Project Awaken" See, http://www.cassiopaea.org/forum/index.php?topic=11824.msg84425#msg84425

I couldn't stand the X-Files for the same reason, but hey, if it helps to plant seeds of awareness, then why not?

 

[Beau]

Maybe my standards are a bit lower, but I loved Independence Day and found Stargate enjoyable. I don't think the idea of humans uniting behind an extraterrestrial force is all that faulty. Unlikely maybe, but that is why it is in the realm of science fiction. It's the same premise behind Watchmen. At the time I was really captivated by ID4. But I am rather partial to sci-fi. Also, Day After Tomorrow is based on the book The Coming Global Superstorm by Whitley Strieber, which is a non-fiction book that the C's notoriously commented on about the accuracy of the sources used for the book. So, not that outside of the realm of possible.

What's that, you don't like X-Files either? :O Maybe sci-fi just isn't your junket...

 

[Woodsman]

Maybe my standards are a bit lower, but I loved Independence Day and found Stargate enjoyable. I don't think the idea of humans uniting behind an extraterrestrial force is all that faulty. Unlikely maybe, but that is why it is in the realm of science fiction. It's the same premise behind Watchmen. At the time I was really captivated by ID4. But I am rather partial to sci-fi. Also, Day After Tomorrow is based on the book The Coming Global Superstorm by Whitley Strieber, which is a non-fiction book that the C's notoriously commented on about the accuracy of the sources used for the book. So, not that outside of the realm of possible.

What's that, you don't like X-Files either? :O Maybe sci-fi just isn't your junket...

This is pretty common, I think, when it comes to ideas we are fascinated by. --For instance, I'm getting a huge kick out of Joss Whedon's new series, "Dollhouse". --I'm utterly fascinated by how it works with the notions of awareness and identity and numerous of the very concepts I'm currently excited by. Reading Gurdjieff and Martha Stout's book, and being familiar with the Greenbaum speech, I find it really neat to think that Joss is exploring connected ideas and that these things are actually being presented in the popular realm. The show itself, however, when looked at strictly from a story-telling perspective, is nowhere nearly as strong as some of Joss' earlier works. Yet I barely even recognized that! --I had a long conversation about the show with a friend of mine who is similarly interested in Sci-Fi. He, however, has zero interest in Work related materials, and he reacted only to the show itself, pointing out a whole host of serious flaws in the story-telling and presentation. After listening to each of his points, I could only blink and say, "Wow, you're totally on the money with all of that. I didn't even see it! My fascination with the concepts behind it took major precedent."

Roland Emmerich films and the X-Files suffer from a long list of weaknesses and flaws in the acting, scripting, dialogue, logic, just everything, --all of which I found made me feel physically ill, (I'm not exaggerating; I felt queasy and dazed afterwards), --but I'd viewed those works well before I had become interested in esoteric out-of-the-box works, like Castaneda and the C's, etc. I'd also spent an extremely huge amount of time and energy studying and working at the craft of story-telling, so the weak points jumped out at me in a big way. I think, in retrospect, that working to wire my brain to be as sensitive to story flaw and story strength as possible means that it takes relatively little 'signal' to elicit a response. For me, I register faulty story-telling as a kind of pain, which I can then use to guide me when trying to carve a piece of story-telling down into a better shape. (Good story, similarly, has a 'reward' good-feeling to it). --I think this is quite common; I've seen many musicians react much the same way, wincing when they hear pieces of music they recognize technical flaws within but which I'll be happily grooving to.

Stargate (the film) in particular had this effect on me. I remember looking over at my friend when the credits rolled; each of us were quite pale from the experience and we found ourselves utterly astonished when the film received an enthusiastic roar of applause (in a movie theater where the creators and actors were not even present!). Everybody, and it was a packed theater, really, *really* enjoyed that film.

I remember actually being angry afterwards because it seemed like such a terrible waste of a really good idea. --But popular response allowed the production of a TV series, which was far less broken. It was light and fluffy and formulaic, but I have enjoyed somewhat that which I've seen. There were also a small handful of episodes of the X-Files which I thought were absolutely remarkable. --The amazing thing is that I even saw them; I studiously avoided the X-Files, only catching a show now and again when room mates were watching over at our place. --But I just happened to be around to see a couple of the episodes which the fan base consider to be of land-mark quality, and I have to agree. (There was a Christmas special in a haunted house and another where High Strangeness was dealt with very well; Mulder was eating a lot of pie in that one). Out of multiple seasons, to have caught the two or three really great episodes among the dozen or so episodes I've watched in total, I think suggests that the subconscious is quite tuned into what we 'need' to be exposed to and guides us to those moments without our consciously being aware. That's one possible theory, anyway.

--Oh, and I also quite enjoyed most of the first X-Files movie. I actually own a copy now, while everybody else I knew who were big fans were quite disappointed by the film. So who can account for taste? I've always been a little off-center wrt my taste in film, and the more I think about it, the more I believe that certain movies speak in certain ways to certain people, and that the connections we best resonate with in films is of equal, if not far greater importance than the quality of the acting, dialogue and technical pacing, etc., of a given work.

Another of my favorites is Doctor Who, which some people I know simply cannot tolerate. Even I recognize that it's barely a step away from 'Muppets in Space', and that many episodes are quite terrible, but nonetheless I turn into a delirious fan boy when it comes to anything 'Tardis'. --And "Doctor Who" is just loaded with themes which resonate with C-style thinking. I love the idea of a hero who refuses to carry a weapon, who exists with an inherent perception of time and space in terms of probability, who loves life and promotes it across all races. Very, very interesting stuff! I see the Doctor as a metaphor for a 4th density being working to close in on a full expression of STO behavior. (He still interferes, so he's not quite there yet. . .) "TARDIS" = "TDRM" ???

I find these days, that unless I resonate with patterns and ideas in film which link to my personal interests, that even a superbly crafted movie often leaves me yawning. This phenomenon is a big point of interest for me lately.

Cheers!

 

[Erna]

While I'm drawn to cataclysmic and apocalyptic movies like a moth is drawn to a flame, and while I enjoyed "Day After Tomorrow" and "Independence Day" (while swallowing the "America is the Greatest" usual tagline), the most obvious deception in both these films is that the government is depicted as "caring about the masses", in contrast to the upcoming "2012" movie.

So while the 2012 movie is singing from a more appropriate song sheet in that regard, I think deception will be the core aim of this project. Baiting the masses with a little bit of truth and a whole lot of lies (their partner website - Institute For Human Continuity - is carrying the Nibiru/Planet X story). I'm not expecting Columbia Pictures to shed any spiritual truths, but the cataclysm only scenario they seem to be going with disappointed me as well, and widespread panic seems to be their aim.

 

[Smallwood]

Hmmm... maybe the Planet X thing on the site is just a diversion? That the real cataclysm in the movie is actually from something else and they only put it up as a cultural reference? IDK, I would seem silly to me to reveal the nature of the cataclysm in a viral ad-site. Nevertheless, I'll be amazed too if they release a movie which actually promotes some spiritual hope (funnily, the trailer does seem to be symbolically hinting that the spiritual aspects have relevance in warning humanity about it's impending doom, as in the monk banging that gong or whatever it was).

Trailer was eery in a right-way, though from all I've gathered, it's going to be exactly the kind of movie that I'll prefer to see only once.