Courtney Howard // Film Critic
GREENLAND 2: MIGRATION
Rated R, 1 hours and 38 minutes
Directed by: Ric Roman Waugh
Starring: Gerard Butler, Morena Baccarin, Roman Griffin Davis, William Abadie, Sophie Thompson, Nelia Valery Da Costa
Grabbing our attention with its disaster movie hook, GREENLAND not only contained epic scenes of destruction, but also audaciously gave us equal amounts of heart. We rooted for the hero and his family to survive a meteor on a collision course with Earth, defy the odds, and make it to a top secret government bunker in the titular country. His journey getting his loved ones to safety felt totally earned, balancing the big spectacle with gobs of pathos.
Director Ric Roman Waugh returns to continue this family’s saga in GREENLAND 2: MIGRATION without missing a beat, capturing the fallout of a world still in chaos from a cataclysmic event. The post-apocalyptic thriller’s follow up is deeply emotional, unrelenting and riveting. Themes centered on belief, sacrifice and compassion radiate throughout. The stakes have grown bigger, the immersive, gorgeously rendered visual effects have gotten bolder and the stunt work has gotten more palm-sweat-inducing.
The Garrity family is suffering the growing pains of a changed world in the 5 years since the Clarke meteor smashed into Earth, rendering most of the planet uninhabitable. Patriarch John (Gerard Butler) is weary, weakened by his role in the mini-utopia as a chief engineer and forager. Mom Allison (Morena Baccarin), while flourishing in a leadership position on the government council, worries about their dwindling food, water and energy supplies as more refugees pile in daily. Their teenage son Nathan (Roman Griffin Davis) is dealing with a slew of depressive feelings surrounding his uncertain future.
As John, Allison and Nathan grapple with their bleak situation, an earthquake hits, driving them and everyone inside the underground bunker out into a desolate environment. If Mother Nature doesn’t kill them with its suddenly-gestating storms, poor air conditions and tsunamis, then the untrusting, feral humans desperate to survive absolutely will. A rumor – propagated by Allison’s scientific and strategist colleagues – has circulated of a valley in the South of France that’s possibly livable. With not much to go on but blind belief and limited street smarts, the family sets out on a cross-country adventure across dangerous terrain, encountering the best and worst of humanity along the way.
Waugh, along with writers Chris Sparling and Mitchell LaFortune, take great craft and care with this sequel that feels less like a traditional sequel and more like an extension of the original. It never suffers from being a second or connecting part, as it’s totally self-contained. It’s a continuing chapter in the Garrity family’s odyssey to rediscover home – or at least a reconfigured meaning of that notion. There’s no “previously on” montage, nor does it waste any time plunging us back into the deep end with these characters. It doesn’t preach to the choir, offering any judgement, but rather holds a mirror up to humanity in all its truest forms, capturing the good, the bad and the ugly in mankind’s behaviors. Plus, it just feels right watching Butler in a touching performance, highlighting what’s worth saving in a hopeless world.
Big action sequences are genuinely harrowing. We start off with an environmental race against the clock that spotlights the awe-inducing visual effects’ scale and scope. Waugh and his collaborators keep multiple plates spinning at all times, from John’s impairments possibly hindering the road trip to the family’s drive to survive at all costs. Character drive is constantly at the forefront of the action. The rope and ladder bridge sequence delivers a visceral charge, as does the footrace to the lifeboats. The meteor debris shower in the forest mimeographs a scene from the first film, but it shows how John, Nathan and Allison use their prior knowledge to thrive in mayhem.
Ample screen-time is devoted to folks the Garritys meet on the road, whether that be opportunistic stranger Obi (Ken Nwosu), who shuttles them out of harm’s way, or Allison’s longtime bestie/ elderly caretaker Mackenzie (Sophie Thompson), who gives them a car, ammo, food and a short respite before rejoining a crumbling human race. Though the story is non-stop, the film gets an adrenaline shot in the arm once they encounter French former postman Denis (William Abadie) and his teen daughter Camille (Nelia Valery Da Costa). Da Costa is a revelation and Abadie delivers heartfelt, vulnerable work.
Mimicking the 2020 original where John is depicted as action hero who is blessedly allowed to get his hands dirty, killing a stranger in order to reunite with his own family, Allison joins the fight. She fires a kill shot at masked bandits, rescuing her hubby and son from sure-fire death. Waugh, Sparling and LaFortune have commendably flipped the script in developing her character over the course of two films. In their capable hands, she’s an innovatively constructed heroine and not a trope-riddled, studio executive conceptualized “Strong Female Character.” They transform her from a one-note disgruntled housewife into a hope-filled savior embodying determination, gumption and self-sufficiency. She’s not exclusively around to service the male arc. She’s here to claim her own identity.
That said, there are a few problems that transpire in the final 15 minutes that threaten to blight its brilliance. The gun Allison saves the day with early on in their trek across the United Kingdom – one she wouldn’t carelessly discard – magically disappears when it would’ve been crucial to have in a later scene. This contrived loss gives way to a significant, but semi-disappointing moment for our hero dealing with insurgents in a 3rd act escalation. The insurgents’ location for this confrontation doesn’t make a lick of sense. Why the antagonists stop where they’ve chosen to stop defies logic, despite providing another obstacle for the family.
Still, GREENLAND 2: MIGRATION is pretty solid entertainment that features both brawn and brains.
Grade: A-
GREENLAND 2: MIGRATION opens on January 9.
