Greenland 2: Migration

Greenland caught me off guard when I saw it some years back. I saw the ads and, like so many other folks, tuned it out as yet another disaster movie. It became background noise. I saw a positive review from a writer I admire, and the gist of it was, "I know it looks derivative, but it's got some real heart to it." And then someone else I knew said they liked it, followed by someone else, and so on and so on. Eventually, I saw it, and I liked it quite a bit. There was an emotional rawness to the film that was sincere. In it, Gerard Butler plays John Garrity, a man who will do anything to protect his family, has a genuine everyman quality to him. He's a smart guy, sure, but he makes boneheaded decisions. He makes mistakes. He's imperfect. In that way, it felt like they took the right lessons from a film like Die Hard, placing a real, human guy into this massive action picture.

And, like Die Hard, we see that character go from "realistic everyman" to "generic action" star in its sequel. John Garrity, structural engineer, is now able to wield pistols with surgeon-like precision and have bullets find their targets in the dark, under pressure of fire. 

Greenland 2: Migration is set years after the events of the original film, after our heroes have found shelter in an underground facility. This many years after a colossal, world-ending event like a comet strike, food is running out, and supplies are dwindling. The structure of the planet itself is shifting, and disaster forces the survivors out into the world, where they seek refuge elsewhere. John and his wife Allison (Morena Baccarin) and his son Nathan (Roman Griffin Davis) head to the impact crater directly, where they've heard that, ironically, life is thriving at the center of what caused so much death.

The journey to the impact crater is rife with danger, as storms rage, earthquakes rattle, and wars rage on. Lightning, explosions, bullets, every which way, as the three of them trek the globe to make it the one place that may offer safety. But, like the original, there are times when everything is still, in a sort of beauty in the moment, like the eye of a hurricane. 

Greenland 2 is not as good as the original film, but it's not a bad one, either. In its opening moments, it does a great job of showing us a community that's been forged and defined by a shared trauma. In fact, in its quieter moments, oddly enough, is when it seems to work the best. When the adrenaline starts pumping, it feels much less organic than its predecessor. The original had a clear logic behind why events were happening, whereas the sequel seems to be driven by the whims of the writer's imagination. Too many colossal events are left unexplained, and instead of being swept up by the chaos, I felt distracted by it.

As an action movie, it certainly delivers. I was entertained throughout, and even enjoyed it on a deeper level than most movies of its type. It's just a shame it couldn't continue the momentum of the original.

Vital Disc Stats: The Blu-ray
Greenland 2: Migration strikes the home video market with a mighty boom, in a single-disc release, housed in a standard case with a removable slipcover. Inside the case is a slip containing a code that can be used for digital redemption.

Greenland 2: Migration was shot digitally by cinematographer Martin Ahlgren using Sony CineAlta Venice 2 cameras and Panavision Panaspeed lenses. I mean, generally, the movie looks terrific. The special effects are both awesome and awe-inspiring, with moments of scale that dwarf our characters, but in smaller, more intimate moments, too. And there are sequences of sheer beauty, too, like in seeing a night sky we've never seen before, along with the characters, with meteors clustered together in a belt in the cosmos, some burning up in the planet's atmosphere. Details are clearly and sharply rendered, with color realization skewing toward warm on character skin tones, and toward the cool end of the spectrum in sequences showcasing a landscape of dectruction. 

I will forever be a sucker for a good Dolby Atmos mix. Yes, Greenland 2 has wall-to-wall sound effects, from above, from behind, as explosions, bullets, and other forms of destruction surround and envelop the listener. But I love cleverness in a sound design in ways that aren't immediately obvious. Take, for example, one of the quieter moments near the beginning of the film, as our characters gather for a social hour in their underground bunker. Music plays and people dance, but the speakers in the sound design are cognizant of where the speakers would be in a room like that, piping in through the PA system's ceiling speakers, so the music plays through the height speakers to simulate that kind of sound, echoing through the front and rear of the soundstage. Through it all, dialogue is kept crisp and clean, whether it's one of those aforementioned quiet moments of reflection or in a louder, more bombastic moment of fire and fury.

Like most new releases, Greenland 2 has a limited offering of supplements, which is really just a quadrilogy of interviews with the director and the three main members of the cast. The interviews are interesting and provide some insight into the film's production and themes.

• Rebuilding (HD 8:01) - Interview with director Ric Roman Waugh
• Pushing Forward (HD 9:47) - Interview with Gerard Butler
• Heart and Soul (HD 7:07) - Interview with Morena Baccarin
• What We Leave Behind (HD 3:12) - Interview with Roman Griffin Davis

Greenland 2 is an unfortunate disappointment after the surprising success of its predecessor, but maybe that was unavoidable. There was a sincerity to the first movie that propelled it, and an investment in the characters, who I wanted to see overcome these tremendous odds. And, in the sequel, that fire just isn't there any longer. And it's not a bad movie! It's well-made, it looks great, the actors give it their all, and there are moments that hint at something that could have been closer to on a par with the original. As such, Greenland 2 is Recommended.