I can’t believe I’m saying this, but “2012” filmmakers should have hired Michael Bay as an “artistic” consultant.

Yes, the same Michael Bay who made “Transformers” and “Pearl Harbor.”

“2012” would have been a better and more original movie if the climatic confrontation featured John Cusack’s character heroically holding up a boom box in the face of surly seismic booms and cataclysmic tsunamis.

And when an Aerosmith cover of “In Your Eyes” played, Mother Nature would shed a tear and give up on her apocalyptic master plan. Doves would fly, bad actors would awkwardly hug and writer/director Roland Emmerich would live to make another box office smash espousing that when humanity is on the brink of extinction, all it takes to save the day is some Hallmark card motivational nuggets, an alpha male hero who’s really trying his best to be a better dad, and comic relief from an alcoholic conspiracy nut. (Choose your poison: In Emmerich’s “Independence Day,” Randy Quaid played this role and Woody Harrelson gets the gig here.)

“2012” is more like “The Day After the Day After Tomorrow.” The movies are strikingly similar, with scenes almost stolen vetbatim, and the one change-up being the plot crux. Emmerich’s “Tomorrow” is a global warming “I told you so" flick while “2012” bastardizes an urban legend about the Mayan calendar and planetary alignment.

Like most of these massively sprawling disaster movies, the plot is told from many fronts. Chiwetel Ejiofor plays the government scientist who helps discover that the sun is microwaving the earth’s gooey middle so much so that the crust that anchors our homes, Super Wal-Marts and early bird buffets is going to start sliding around. He’s pitted against a stuffy White House cabinet member (Oliver Platt) and makes nice with a platitude-spewing president played by Danny Glover. (What, Morgan Freeman wasn’t available?!)

Meanwhile, Cusack plays failed author and limo driver Jackson Curtis, who’s pitted against an ex-wife (Amanda Peet) over their kids and her new beau (Thomas McCarthy). Of course, a family vacation to Yellowstone brings Cusack & Co. to ground zero for the impending global meltdown and into the dead center of the end-of-days action.

Honestly, I’d rather have the junk science of “The Day After Tomorrow” than no science at all. Heck, science fiction would be nice. But in "2012," all we get are some scientists looking at screens and shouting. While Emmerich’s earthquakes and storms are jaw-dropping eye candy, a day drunk bellied up to an Applebee’s margarita could debunk most of this stuff. Heck, the real-life Woody Harrelson could debunk this stuff. Well, same thing.

But it’s not so much the big happenings that bother me so much in “2012” as the little things. Why must a movie that asks us to suspend our disbelief on such a global level also force us to make dozens of unecessary leaps of faith regarding bizarre coincidences that tie the story together?.

Mr. Emmerich, we’re giving you 150 minutes so you can avoid writing these types of scenes: “Holy sh*t, it’s my gruff Russian employer, his hussy girlfriend and their toy dog from halfway across the country right here at the Las vegas airport. They have a plane that will take us to China, where the map I got from the weirdo I met in the woods says the government is building spaceships that will takes us to safety. Oh no, we need a co-pilot! What's that ex-wife, your new boyfriend is taking flying lessons? Let’s grab him and go!"

I assure that the actual scene I’m referencing is far, far worse.

Finally, I don’t get the point of “2012.” At least “Independence Day” taught us to be nice to each other and buy Will Smith CDs. And “The Day After Tomorrow” made us feel guilty for spraying Pam and air freshener. What is the message behind “2012?”  

I guess the message is that when the ends comes, you either need to be rich enough to afford a ticket on the high-tech getaway boat, or you need to be a really good swimmer.

Maybe the Mayans had it right. Blood-letting and animal sacrifice are more entertaining than disaster popcorn movies.

"2012," with a running time of 158 minutes, is rated PG-13. Mike gives the movie two out of four stars.

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