San Andreas Review

Dwayne Johnson wrestles with an earthquake that rocks the West coast.
 

California is the soon-to-be shaken setting for San Andreas, where anyone adverse to suntan has a lot more to worry about than the prickly heat. As helicopter pilot Ray Gaines, an appropriate name for The Rock’s character, who seems to surpass only himself in size as each of his films sweep by, the former pro wrestler turned heavy-set movie star throws thrills, as well as himself, into the tide of this silly disaster flick.

San Andreas’s waves of quality undulate on the Richter scale. Any sign of a strong story-line falls to the ground with the first of many skyscrapers. The unstoppable force of CGI takes control, and threatens Johnson’s top billing as the star of the movie. However, just as Johnny Depp is the new face of Dior, The Rock is the new face of the (sometimes 3D) action genre. I would not say he captivates as Ray, though he is rather watchable as a much-more-than-capable rescue pilot intent on finding his daughter Blake (Alexandra Daddario), who is sitting pretty high up in one of those vulnerable skyscrapers, that is until disaster deals a tsunami. Ray, assisted by his ex-wife Emma (Carla Gugino), who he saves from the devastation of Los Angeles and whom he is still enamoured by, races into risky tectonic territory to locate his estranged daughter. This, whilst avoiding emphatic aftershocks.

I am usually unshaken by this particular film template; the format is prosaic and it is prone to containing an airless plot. Having said this, I cannot ridicule San Andreas too much (it’s had enough aftershocks as it is). The ridiculousness is refined by good performances from Gugino and Paul Giamatti, who plays a seismologist armed with a fistful of clichés such as, ‘you need to get out, if you can’t, god be with you’. Giammati’s speech and gestures tremor even more than the earthquakes, though he doesn’t quite cause as much damage. He is consistently a likable figure on film, his awful cameo in the The Amazing Spiderman 2 being the exemption. Yet, there is no one more likable here than The Rock. His oeuvre lacks a masterpiece, and San Andreas isn’t one. Though, his presence is enough. It wasn’t enough for The Tooth Fairy or Race to Witch Mountain, but here he steadies what could have been a sinkable ship.   

San Andreas does hark back to 70’s blockbuster fare like Earthquake (of course) and The Towering Inferno. There was a pleasurable trashiness to 1974’s Earthquake in particular, and this is certainly true of this film too. The spectacularly realised CGI is where the comparability with these 70’s disaster movies ends. The impressive special effects blitz is more ominous than the inclination that what we are viewing could actually happen in reality. Due to this, it has similarities also with more recent films that dine with natural disaster, like The Day After Tomorrow and Deep Impact.    

Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson has muscled into the top of the Box Office, and deservedly so. Dumb and fun, just don’t take it too seriously.