If you find joy in the epic world destruction.. No, we wouldn’t judge you! We all like to see the glorified stories of disasters and the world ending, perhaps to find some meaning in our lives.
Or maybe it is more of an entertainment factor. In any case, disaster movies with the end of the world or almost end of the world or even some level of destruction have their own fanbase.
A lot of people love to go back to Independence Day (1996). 2012 (2009) or The Day After Tomorrow (2004) and even Deep Impact (1993).
Such films always had been a great watch especially to see different creative ways on how the world could end.
Sometimes they are much closer to reality like a pandemic as we all faced a much smaller version of it last year. Or it could be ridiculous and way too far from any scientific logic.
So, without further ado, let’s go into the list and get you something to watch this week.
The Day After Tomorrow (2004)
Perhaps, the first disaster movie ( at least successful) to show the end of the world or almost the end of the world in a movie.
This film became quite a stepping stone to further movies that are about looming disasters with actual grand-scale destruction shown in the film.
It’s not that we haven’t seen the destruction in movies earlier. Just a millennium back, Roland Emmerich himself leveled New York in the movie Gozilla and also exploded the White House on Independence Day.
But this climate-driven disaster movie portrayed climate change as an antagonist but rather gradual it is dramatically faster and more destructive.
There are earthquakes leveling portions of cities, floods swiping the coasts, superstorms coverings and plunging the northern hemisphere into a new ice age, and all kinds of climate havoc around the globe.
The film did play up all the anxieties around the planet’s health today and how the conversation about it is still in the debates but not much-affecting people’s life.
2012 (2009)
2012 was one of the game-changing disaster movies that visually presented the end of the world at a great scale.
It was more or less, the second disaster movie that showed the end of the world. Roland Emmerich already has shown more than half the planet was destroyed in 2004’s released The Day After Tomorrow.
The movie capitalizes on the popular theory of the ‘Mayan Apocalypse’ regarding the prediction of the end of the world in 2012, hence the title of the movie.
It starts with Dr. Adrian Helmsley who is a part of a global geophysical team investigating the impact of radiation coming from unprecedented solar storms.
This team eventually discovered that the Earth’s core is heating up which is going to bring a series of disasters at a grand scale predicting the end of the world in the year 2012.
The team war with U.S President Thomas Wilson and soon countries come together to save the human race from extinction rather than saving the earth, they try to find a way to survive the end of the world.
If you wonder what would happen if the world ended with numerous disasters coming together at its worst including earthquakes, floods, etc, this movie has one of the high-quality VFX to show that.
Deep Impact (1998)
Deep Impact was actually released in the same year when Michael Bay released his cheesy mega-blockbuster movie Armageddon with a more or less similar plot.
This disaster film was about a meteor that is rushing towards planet Earth and going to strike so hard that it will wipe out the humans from their existence.
However, a group of brave and heroic astronauts goes on a mission to destroy this asteroid before it hits the Earth.
So, in contrast to Michael Bay’s Armageddon, this film is tonally different. If you are going for more action-packed cheesy and popcorn-eating fun movies, then Bay’s movie is perfect for you.
However, if you are looking forward to watching a more realistic approach towards an actual extensive level threat to the world Mimi Leder’s movie, Deep Impact is ideal.
This movie focussed a lot on how people will react, and governments come together to deal with it and basically, an actual unfolding of events in potentially such world-ending level events if ever comes.
Deep Impact is certainly more accurate and realistic. The movie has strong characters with driven motives, and in fact, real science backing their explosions and space scenes.
Armageddon (1998)
As mentioned earlier, Armageddon is quite similar to Deep Impact but much more cheesier and entertaining in its dramatic and action aspects, and it has to, as it is from Michael Bay.
The movie has the familiar plot of the other movie released in the same year, Deep Impact, where there is an asteroid going to hit Planet Earth which is going to wipe the human race out of existence.
However, since the realistic approach in the Deep Impact limits their narrative, Armageddon goes beyond in its sheer and unabashed ridiculousness to reflect this larger looming world-ending threat.
It is said that a rock the size of Texas is going to hit the planet as it is on a collision course already and the idea that the U.S government came up with was to send Bruce Willis and a crew of oil drillers into space to blow this up from inside.
Not to miss the romantic subplots between Liv Tyler and babyfaced Ben Affleck as well. And other relationships and brotherhood elements in the movie, really elevate the drama and stakes.
World War Z
Very few zombie movies are disaster movies, surely they are sometimes post-apocalyptic but not disastrous in terms of scale, but this one is!
World War Z, as it sounds, takes the concept of the zombie outbreak and magnifies the scale to make it look like a zombie pandemic.
Where usually most zombie outbreak movies focus on a town or a neighborhood, this movie takes the audience through places to show the impact on a global scale.
World War Z goes beyond the intimate question of survival rather than the apocalyptic question – Will zombies end the human race?
This movie is basically a big-budget adaptation of a best-selling oral history of fiction global outbreak by Max Brooks blending the beats of a disaster movie and a zombie movie together.
We see this outbreak through the perspective of a character played by Brad Pitt who is looking for a vaccine around the world.
Knowing (2009)
Nicholas Cage plays an MIT astrophysics professor who accidentally stumbled upon cryptic signs that signify the end of the world.
The movie is different from a usual disaster movie which is more about these troubling visions of an inevitable global catastrophe.
The film also bases its plot a lot on the anxiety related to the post-millennial environment concerns and anxieties of young people.
The movie is quite mysterious and Nicholas Cage carried out this mystery thrilling apocalyptic movie very well as this fidgety scientist trying to save all.
San Andreas (2015)
Another recently released Disaster movie that visually portrays the destruction the best way possible you can see in a live-action movie.
More than that, it is also interesting to see Dwayne Johnson combating not a person but a natural calamity with all his badassery intact.
The film centers around California’s San Andreas, one final big hit of an earthquake that literally tears through the state from one end to another destroying everything on its way.
We follow this destruction through these characters, a family including helicopter pilot Raymond Gaines (Dwayne Johnson), her separated wife ( Carla Gugino), and their daughter (Alexandra Daddario) surviving the havoc together despite being in two different cities.
The film has great visual effects and destruction scenes are very well portrayed with some real dramatic beats in the movie, making up a movie that you are also emotionally invested in.
This Is The End (2013)
You can find comedy in the least expected places. This goes brilliantly with disaster films which at the core are funny but not always intentional.
This Is The End, released in 2003 is a movie featuring perhaps all the comedy actors from Hollywood putting together in a house.
The film features talent powerhouse Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg making this parody of celebrities, the overall party culture, and Hollywood.
But only until they find themselves in the middle of an apocalypse. So basically, the movie first of all seemed to be just a hangout movie before it turned into an apocalypse movie.
Contagion (2011)
After a brief introduction to how a pandemic can end the world that we faced in real life, Steven Soderberg’s pandemic disaster movie surfaced and felt even more real last year.
Now, since people found this new resonance in this movie, it is indeed scary to feel so close to this type of apocalypse.
However, this movie provides such an enticing realistic approach with its great dramatic beats and is certainly a good watch when it comes to disaster/end-of-the-world movies.
Contagion was a virus outbreak that swept away the countries where a handful of characters are trying to control the scenario and protect as many people as they can.
Reportedly, the director of this film is working on a sequel.
Geostorm (2017)
A much recent addition to disaster movies with great visuals is Geostorm released in 2017 featuring Gerald Butler.
The plot of the movie makes you think completely out of the box such as what if there could be a machine to prevent global warming but then it gets used for evil purposes?
Also, we have Gerald Butler as a satellite designer who can fix it. The movie comes as this big-concept disaster movie with a rescue mission touch along with a political thriller and silly sci-fi elements.
If not anything, the film is definitely entertaining and fun to watch. However, the movie tanked at the box office however it was unfavorably compared to Sharknado.
The Core (2003)
The Core. released in 2003, so scientifically inaccurate that it managed to piss most of the scientific community as much as very few movies have ever managed to.
Even though the plot of the movie is quite plausible in terms of imagination, it is undoubtedly ridiculous to be said is sci-fi or even remotely scientific.
However, if you remove that aspect, the movie is pretty fun to watch. Or at least a notable disaster movie with an apocalyptic threat to save from.
Again, going on the tracks of Armageddon, this movie also brought together a ragtag crew of scientists of various domains who are sent to literally the center of the earth.
Their mission is to basically restart Earth’s failing molten core using nuclear Bombs! Right, even the basic geology will call bullshit on this plot but letting it go, it is a crazy ride from there.
You just better treat this movie as a fantasy, and you will be good to go.
Featured Image Source: IMDb