Earth Day disaster movies

Destroying the planet is Hollywood’s way of going green

Have you noticed whenever a Hollywood movie deals with the environment its plot usually involves the destruction of Earth? These environmental disaster movies often fly in the face of basic logic, usually aiming for a “woah, cool” response from the viewer rather than any renewed interest in environmental activism.  

Disney has taken the opposite approach with two years of warm and fuzzy family-targeted documentaries (this year it's "Oceans," last year it was “Earth”) but that’s not enough to let Hollywood off the hook. As our own way of celebrating Earth Day, we’re rating the overall credibility of Hollywood’s environmental disasters on a scale of 1 to 10—1 being insultingly silly, and 10 being respectably fact-based. Read on for the results—ideally by the light of an energy-saving bulb. —Brett Buckalew, Special to Metromix