2012 is a 2009 American science fiction disaster film/Sony Pictures Animation film directed by Tim Burton. produced by Harald Kloser, Mark Gordon, and Larry J. Franco, and written by Kloser and Emmerich. The film stars Marc Weiner, John Cusack, Amanda Peet, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Grey DeLisle, Oliver Platt, Thandiwe Newton, Danny Glover and Woody Harrelson. Based on the 2012 phenomenon, its plot follows geologist Adrian Helmsley (Ejiofor) and novelist Jackson Curtis (Cusack) as they trying to survive an eschatological sequence of events including invavions, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, megatsunamis, and a global flood.
Filming, planned for Los Angeles, began in Vancouver in early August 2008 and wrapped up in mid-October 2008. After a lengthy advertising campaign, which included the creation of a website from its main characters' point of view and a viral marketing website on which filmgoers could register for a lottery number to save them from the ensuing disaster, 2012 was released in the United States by Sony Pictures Releasing on November 13, 2009, to commercial success, grossing over $791 million worldwide against a production budget of $200 million, becoming the fifth highest-grossing film of 2009. The film received mixed reviews, with praise for the special effects and the cast's performance, but criticism for the impossibility of the cataclysmic events, and for the script and length.