The trailers released so far absolutely don't do justice to San Andreas' visual effects in the final product: seeing them in sequence on the big screen is a sure marvel, and easily the biggest feather in the film's cap. It's actually pretty surprising that the movie only cost $100 million given how so much of the film relies on CGI, but every penny is clearly on the screen, and it looks substantially better than many movies which have cost upwards of double that price tag. While a lot of similar apocalyptic movies struggle with visually incomprehensible effects which make everything look like an ugly smear, or unconvincing CGI puppets doubling for dying humans, here everything's pretty sharp for the most part: Peyton directs the carnage so that the audience is aware at all times what's going on and who has a spatial relation to what. It's refreshing to see this approach, and it's certainly one other filmmakers should be taking cues from. This is some of the best-realised digital insanity in recent memory, regardless of how middling the more human elements of the film may be (but more on that later).
Stay at home dad who spends as much time teaching his kids the merits of Martin Scorsese as possible (against the missus' wishes).
General video game, TV and film nut. Occasional sports fan. Full time loon.
