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The Destruction of Los Angeles | 2012
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- Published on Feb 16, 2026
- As Los Angeles crumbles around them, Jackson (John Cusack) and his family make a daring attempt to escape the city by plane… | Buy or rent 2012 here: amzo.in/movie/...
Dr. Adrian Helmsley, part of a worldwide geophysical team investigating the effect on the earth of radiation from unprecedented solar storms, learns that the earth's core is heating up. He warns U.S. President Thomas Wilson that the crust of the earth is becoming unstable and that without proper preparations for saving a fraction of the world's population, the entire race is doomed. Meanwhile, writer Jackson Curtis stumbles on the same information. While the world's leaders race to build "arks" to escape the impending cataclysm, Curtis struggles to find a way to save his family. Meanwhile, volcanic eruptions and earthquakes of unprecedented strength wreak havoc around the world.
© Sony Pictures
0 points for realism, 100 points for entertainment
Thats the Reason I watch this all the time.
Bruh I gotta have at least 30% realistic points before I can be entertained, I just get frustrated by the conflict points that don't need to happen 😂 just show me the destruction and the escape with some sense!
They got the governor right!
How would you know what's true and what's not, brother?
@darkriku12 yea fr. Like I like to imagine people wouldn't be doing dumb stuff like questioning a guy who was right about an earthquake after calling it or being a little more panicked and not commenting on smells, preflight checks and saying sorry about hitting a car. The acting was the most unrealistic part! lol
The amount of destruction, and people falling to their death screaming in agony, this scene is both spectacular and horrifying.
I shall make up the word“specterrifying”.
@robertnelson9599 death defying
Really? I'm laughing at it all 😂 It's so corny lol
It made me slightly hungry.
Same for a hot dog@PauloAdriano-zo2ng
When we said we were waiting for a California housing market crash, this isn't quite what we meant.
😂 the greatest comment ever
No, no, it is.
A crater where a house stood would still be $1,000,000
I fucking love the comment section 😂😂😂
@quinnalexandra2826 WATCH YOUR MOUTH! >:(
The plot armour in this movie is insane
They had so much luck throughout the movie that it's even more unrealistic than the actual end of the world.
I normally really *really* hate a lot of these things the movie has but God damn it was it so badass in doing them. Seeing today's ass movies having a minimum fraction of this movies stuff really makes me appreciate the stuff here
It was essentially a plot force field
bruh all main characters have plot armor plus its a MOVIE, what would be interesting about a movie if the main characters die early 🤦🏿
@spiderfan456 mcu movie is your best example. Lots of main characters dead
New Yorkers' description of the April 5 2024 "earthquake"
A 4.8 in an area that doesn’t get a lot of earthquakes feels like a big deal.
Baby @PDC1987
😂😂
@thenicobossy which has absolutely nothing to do with how it feels for people who do not normally experience earthquakes.
Bunch of cry babies
Cannot believe how bad the Scwarzenegger impression is 😂
Except it’s actually him.
@kellygarland63no its not😂🤣
The voice and looks aren’t even close 😂
What the heck is Scwarzenegger?
@mm3lunahe was the governor of California during this time period irl. He also played famous roles in movies like Terminator
The amount of main character energy is needed to survive all that is crazy
A classic movie forsure
watching this back nowadays makes it feel silly but the first time seeing this movie had me in disbelief 😅😂
"Mommy, why was that plane flying so low?"
"Oh sweetie, those are the main characters, we're going to die but hey, they get to live"
@SIMIFUlol
A classic??? This movie sucked and was literally based on the idea of the world ending in 2012… which it didn’t….
@wesgebauer7099Can you back that up with evidence?
It’s unrealistic as fuck that the protagonists survived this, but damn it makes for a good, mind numbing action film
Protagonist never dies 🗿 👍
It's not mind numbing, it's hilarious 😅
Plot armor
The CGI and attention-to-detail of the destruction in this movie is honestly all there is to like about it but it does that SO well
This movie SCREWED me up when I saw it in theaters. I was honestly in tears, thinking about some cataclysmic event happening and not being able to save my family.
SAME! Scared the piss out of me, couldn't focus on my exams after I saw this.
I was convinced London was gonna be swallowed by the sea!
poor family!
Was this
Ment to be a comedy, it's really stupid if not
I watched this when I was 6, i cried for 3 days.
@jameshaywood878 If you're going to come after someone for their comment, maybe make sure you didn't make stupid mistakes. It's *meant, not ment.
There was literally no reason for that guy to be flying THAT low for THAT long. Absolute psychopath
ikr? like "now that we're in the air let's take a guided tour of LA as it slowly slides off into the ocean along with the rest of the entire Pacific plate" LOL! 🤣
Thing is, if you look carefully, you realize... the plane never actually took off
He was flying too slow to take off; the ground itself sunk
@theonebman7581yeah
until you realize that the plane never gained enough speed to take off and just gilded through the underground, and only then did they get speed afterwards to fly higher
one of the slightly more accurate things about this disaster movie
The falling ground below them likely would have caused an insane downdraft and made it very difficult for the lift produced by the plane to counteract
“Take the La Freeway, it’ll be half the time”. I always laugh at this part because I’ve never been to LA but ik enough about it that u should never take the freeway if you’re trying to get somewhere quick, especially in a chaotic situation like this 😭
Former L.A. resident and can confirm everything you know about the freeway system is painfully true 😅
I was going to say the most unrealistic thing about this entire movie was someone who lives in LA saying to take the highway, it would be faster 😂
@kirbystarnino4199 EXACTLY 🤣
I feel like while it's a decent idea *normally* because freeway = faster than residential roads... Two problems with that plan.
1) It's the most extreme earthquake that the world has ever seen, so most tall structures, including highways, will collapse.
2) Even if the highway *somehow* stays intact, chances are, many other people would have had the same idea which clogs up the highway with the sheer amount of people, or because someone panicked and crashed into the divider, creating a pileup.
@shibainu2528true so its kinda mid
7:47 Sucks for those stuck in the middle there.
Угу. Полный пиздец. Время молиться.
Yea ur right
At least they're alive. And able to be rescued...maybe.
@stealth5758yeah they will
3:35 give that running guy an Oscar 😂😂
LMFAO
tbf that is exactly how i would react in this scenario
He kinda runs like t-1000 from terminator 2
The people on the highways and on the roads falling to their deaths hits really hard. Usually as audience members we feel empathy, but the characters are always probably thinking, “so glad I ain’t them.”
The producers were very smart to have Californians as the victims, because otherwise the audience might have been upset.
@daleviker5884 Why would you say that?
@taylermuilenburg5029 everyone hates Cal pal
@dogcitycanarycalifornia props your country up lmao
@dogcitycanarywhos everyone?
I'm crying with laughter watching this, the level of destruction combined with the plot armour is just too good
Yeah. It's too much. If it were realistic I'd be emotionally invested but this is so ridiculous it's funny. 😂😂😂
“Seems to me the worst is over”
The earth casually tearing itself apart.
The most unbelievable chase scenes ever made
Straight facts
😊
Especially when those two old women would not have crashed with how slow they were going
PauloHernandezXDWell, signal-wise, Yellowstone isn’t really that far from L.A, he probably could’ve just barely received it.
Oh cmon. Compared to a Fast and Furious film this is as realistic as it gets! 😂
Jackson (the main character) actually orchestrated everything in this movie so that his ex-wife's boyfriend dies so that he can bond with her again
They did the boyfriend so dirty lol
I never trusted Jackson.
Damn know that's just wrong
He even dumped his car 😂
wow he even destabilized the pacific plate just to get back with his wife that’s crazy
Underrated scene. This movie gets weird at the end but the first two hours is solid af
It's only weird because they said only Africa exists as a land mass.
Curious what about the ending is weird for you
The last half kinda sucks when it comes to action ngl
@ronj7658 Maybe the part where they treat the ending as humanity being decent despite the fact that all the people they had mercy on and let onto the arks were uber rich people. They treat it as if they had just saved the common people who allowed the rich to get so wealthy. Nope all of us normies died after making the uber rich the money they needed to be saved, but this is supposed to be humanities moment of beauty. It was also given religious undertones, even though it isn't the rich that are supposed to be saved in the end if you go by the bible. Not only that but they treat Africa as the promised land, however every African on Africa would have been dead due to the landmass raising thousands of feet in elevation in only a few days. So basically if you go by the religious interpretation then that would mean god killed all of africa to give the land to the western world after the apocalypse which has weird racial messaging as it is. No matter what though, all of Africa died so that (mostly white people) could take the land, and nobody seems sad about the rest of humanity dying.
@neffdigitydogbecause it's a new beginning all those old emotions and concepts of racism and being divided are no more.......the idea of the ending is that humanity can survive and build a better future together.....save your racist rant for somewhere else..
7:27 I love that John Cusack is screaming in terror like he wasn't just doing the same shit or worse to the other people in his limo 5 minutes ago.
now that he’s not at the wheel anymore, the hyper focus of being in control wore off i guess lmao
The best scene in the entire movie. The Death and Destruction in this scene alone is pretty damn insane and the special effects hold up pretty well for a movie that came out 15 years ago. I can’t imagine how terrifying it would be to experience a scenario like this only to die a horrifying death with the ground disappearing beneath your feet, at that point it would be pointless to be scared anymore and to just accept your fate as you fall into what looks like a bottomless pit
turn to Christ❤
@5starrsamamen
@5starrsamma'am this is wendy's
The worst part about it is the fact la had no traffic
Such a movie doesn't deserve an analysis like yours
Say what you will about this movie, the destruction scenes are some of the best Emmerich ever directed, and it’s legitimately scary to see the city fall apart around the characters.
Absolutely. All the destruction scenes in this movie, I can watch time and time again and it still leaves an impact on me. And I have seen this movie multiple times already, and it still holds up well!
@jordantolkar2586The physics range from questionable to complete nonsense, but the visuals and choreography are top-notch. Up there with Davy Jones and the Titanic sinking for CGI that’s aged well.
The destruction alone in this movie makes it his best disaster movie out of everything he's made in my opinion. Because of how the characters react as it's happening, and the visuals. Seeing his kids just scream in terror cemented this movie for me
@UrbanNoizeMusic Where's Lily's Teacher?
In REALITY it will be alot worse ! Think of it like a mega 500 KLM sont hole !
I watched this movie again with my 6yo daughter, it was her first time watching it, when this first destruction scene came up, she asked, "Pa, how did you survive all this?" 😅
Oh my god, you shouldn't watch that with a 6 year old 😑
@Fruechtchenboo hoo lil bro 🤡
Kids are brutal. My niece asked my sister what were the 60s like, and if she met MLK! My sister is 40 btw 🤣
bruv what you think this is? evil dead?
Tell all this are come if human do selfinesss things with out careing of nature it's not a laughing waste fellow 😐
that final part of the scene where the whole plate is sliding off into the ocean was both epic and horrifying 😮
I dont know hiw thats possible, wasnt it a 10.9 magnitude earthquake as it broke scales
8:36
1:30 Never say the worst is over. It only means the worst is just getting started.
Cliche, right?
I always thought he said the world was over and it made sense because it was
Whoever did that Schwarzenegger impression absolutely butchered it 😂😂
where
i didnt know Schwarzenegger could do a bad Schwarzenegger impression....
@dani1999n That wasn't Schwarzenegger it was an actor doing an impression of him. Don't believe me look at the end credits. Do you see his name in there at all?
@hhds113didn't knew it was an actor, its impressive
@dani1999nthe guys an actor he's reading a script! 1:13
The scene would be more intense & terrifying if they took out the comedy elements
This whole scene is ridiculous comedy.
Everything about this scene is ridiculous.
Imagine Parody in This Is The End
there are no comedy elements. at least, ones that are intentional 😂
7:12 the subway says hello
More like “let me introduce myself”
6:02 "Let him cook!!!"
10 seconds later
"WE ARE COOKED!!!!"
My boss: you’re still coming into work tomorrow right?
8:36 Oh no, there goes Homer Simpson's Doughnut on the loose.
This scene is the most sensationally terrifying thing I’ve ever watched
"My hats!" Kid, you've got a Hell of a lot more to worry about than your damn hats.
Amazing how cars can still work after getting that kind of damage in action movies, but in horror movies, cars will stop working just because the Sun set
😂😂😂😂😂😂😂
the car gets scared and freezes in shock in horror, while in action it gets a rush of adrenaline
Despite how so-so the movie is overall these are simply some of the coolest special effects I've ever seen in a theatre.
3:06 hang on to those eggs dear… 1 minute later: *dies*
5:48 the entire Los Angeles ground is about to collapse by the force of the earthquake
I mean considering just about all of California is built on land that's technically not part of the continental plate it's not that surprising.
Moments later, the San Andreas fault moves and creates a chain reaction on the Ring of Fire. A lot predicted this to happen in 2012 even though this film came out in 2009
as Dr. Phlox (LOL sorry couldn't resist....the guy playing one of the scientists is the same actor 😛 ) stated "The entire Pacific plate is destabilizing"....so yeah that's pretty much the whole plate sliding off into the ocean at that point
7:05 I’d be hugging my family in that scene
This scene is a childhood classic for me, it’s also so well done too for a 2009 film
Technology wasn't thag arcaic in 2009
@hectordiaz1575wdym they had just discovered gravity on 2009?
Kid, there are literally hundreds of great special effects-driven movies that came out long before 2012.
Transformers.. 😂
Knowing is better
"Get in the fucking car now!!!!! Move your ass!!!"
That part always gets me.
For the destruction of Los Angeles, I'm sure Scrat has something to do with it.
if this were happening around Christmas time I'd joke that the fruitcakes probably survived all that.....including the pressures at the bottom of the ocean LOL 😛
@josephamendolea3431 I read this on the morning of December 25th. Merry Christmas!
RIP to all of the cats and dogs who lost their lives during this.
Uh, what about the people???
@SvanTowerMan I couldn't care less about them...
@JustChill_1031 Fair. They're Californians.
@SvanTowerMan You get it! 👍
:l
This aged well…
Little girl saying “my house!” Like she pays the mortgage 😭🤡😂
Lily Curtis said, "My Hats!", not "My House!" because she likes her Hats, similarly to Tamara, which we see later in the Movie.
😲😨😱
Undoubtedly the best scene of the movie
this scene is even crazier when you realize that some people might have survived the earthquake and were probably looting after Los Angeles fell
What looting? It all went underwater.
@SCP_Wandsman13_13 Fine, they went scuba diving for cash or jewelry. 😂
Even if they survived the earthquake, tsunamis followed, and after that Yellowstone erupted, Remember the scene where Vegas gets destroyed by the ashcloud? Vegas is not that far from LA
assuming parts of it did not completely get submerged in water or eaten by the yellowstone ash what else are you supposed to do lol
Obviously looting is bad. But what else is there to do in a shtf scenario like this. Nobody is going to survive. If you have a way to try, then take your best chance and good luck to you. It hardly counts as stealing at that point.
3:41 said no one ever-
😂
Underrated comment 😂
3:05 ‘hold on to those eggs dear’ hits hard
1:43 That combination of car alarms has been forever ingrained in my head as a siren indicating the end of times
If there's anything these movies have taught me always listen to the crazy people
Its sad seeing the police and fire department still attempt to help people even tho they know they are going to die
nah it’s the opposite it should inspire you to see people helping others no matter the situation
That's true but unfortunately it's part of the job | *V*
I cant help but think of all of the poor animals, critters, and pets that had to suffer but its only a movie yet i still cant shake the feeling
Bro my cousin showed me this clip a few years ago and I started crying thinking it was in real life😭
😲😨😱
RIP to all those we lost in the 2012 cataclysms........
2:54 Imagine driving to work and seeing that behind you.
😂
BACK IN MY DAY
And your boss calls and says: “So you’re still coming in on time right? We are short staffed!” 😂
You know you’re cooked
100000% just thought of that now! I would throw that bish out
Those children are gonna have a wild story for they're kids
I feel bad for those grandmas 3:05
Bitch won't stop wasting your time. Even if the fucking world is ending
they slow ahh deserved it
I think the reason why the plane had trouble getting higher off the ground is due to physics. The ground sinking like that must’ve caused air to rush downward all at once, and with great force and speed. This would’ve made it very difficult for the pilot to get any sort of altitude for a while. Everyone on board that plane was extremely lucky the pilot was able to get the plane up into the sky and away from the city. One wrong move, and the plane, plus everyone on board, would’ve been destroyed in an instant.
Think of rapture for church pilot as Jesus Christ
Also, because they only went 80 knots before liftoff instead of 85. I'm presuming that had an impact.
Old mate took them on the scenic route from the airport.
😂😂
2:57 Shout out to that disciple of Goggins.
This is how my parents think driving tests work.
"LA authorities say there's nothing to worry about" Sounds like Newsom and Bass😂😂
lol he just never pulled up in the plane 🤣
That scene was intense, you can believe that.
2012 was scuffed AF this movie terrified me watching a couple clips of this film this is scuffed 😨😰
1:35 that sounded like a roar.
Footage of hollywood after Godzilla Minus One:
the plot armor was crazy.
2009 - earthquake
2025 - wildfire 😢😢
I was about to comment the same thing. 😝
America lost their faith in God
@AfiqJohan-ud5sk Not entirely. And the part that wasn't lost is growing again.
Gotta love how the cracks in the earth are always right behind them.
This gave me nightmares when I watched this as a kid
This is the best scene of the entire movie. It is epic, scary, and terrifying
that's so much earthquake like crazy 😨😨😨😨
This was the final boss of disaster films
Agreed! Kudos to your PFP
I was actually so invested into this video🙏
And NOTHING of value was lost...
We survived. The Mayan calendar ending in 2012 didn’t mean the end of the world. It met the end of a cycle.
I don't like this new cycle.
@ВладимирКруглов-к9оlol
The world is already ending by the way it is currently lmao
I was 9 when this came out, this is scene is SEERED into my brain
1:35 earthquake starts to beigen
8:40 POV: Chapter 4 Fortnite Map
Driving through that office building crossed the line of believability
I like the little detail that after Arnold says that the worst is over and the earthquake happens it happens on the tv too
That's not him
@CardinalClippy the character or the actor? I mean who else talks like that and Kate even referred to him as the governor which Arnold was
@axelnilsson5124 it was an actor doing an impersonation of Schwarzenegger. The real Schwarzenegger stopped being governor in 2011 in the real 2012 it wouldn't have been him anyway.
@CardinalClippybut it is Schwarzenegger in-universe so what I said still stands unless there is a limit to how long California has a governor like with the president which I don’t know about
Right there immediately after YT algo showed me this after LA wildfire broke out. This is literally wild.
3:48 he looks like ron weasly
That limo would be a cherished memory. What a great car.
Pov: Universal's friendliest ride
POV: when caseoh does a jumping jack
POV: your in a roblox obby
Imagine eating lunch then doing this 10 seconds later
Jackson hurry up look behind you
The look he gives Jackson when the Porsche falls in the sinkhole after getting reversed into 😂😂😂😂
I watched this movie when I was 9😢 it was so good time flyes
who asked
@cinna_to4st_waff1esi did
@cinna_to4st_waff1esi bet bro watched this film in 2024
No matter how absurd and unrealistic it is, this movie is beautiful.
8:37 LA just experienced first hand what the passengers on titanic did way back when
This would make a great 3d roller coaster
This prequel to Horizon Zero Dawn is crazy.
It’s insane how accurate the opening is.
I feel bad for the ladies in the yellow car😢😢😢
This Limo and a family aura is insane they are good actors
Who’s here in 2040 when this went down In 2032 20 years off when we thought it would happen in 2012 and now we’ve rebuilt the world
I remember that but tbh it was kinda cool going to mars for the first time
You guys went to mars during that? Our company made us go back in time to get several important people out of the areas of destruction.
@kevinjockey12 dang thats rough
Lol
Least there are not many stupid people as there was before