hollywoods Landmark Problem: Is Cinema Running Out of Original Ways to Signal the End of the World?
A new analysis reveals a troubling trend in disaster filmmaking: the repetitive destruction of the world’s most iconic landmarks,raising questions about Hollywood’s creative imagination.
The release of Greenland 2 feels, to some, like a cinematic inevitability – and not a notably well-timed one. As one observer noted,the original Greenland concluded with a scenario where the entire world was facing imminent destruction by meteors,making a sequel feel somewhat illogical.Beyond the narrative concerns, the timing of a film focused on American efforts surrounding Greenland is “a little on the nose,” given current geopolitical events.
But the sequel’s reliance on familiar tropes – including the destruction of famous landmarks – is part of a larger pattern. The Sydney Opera house, such as, has been virtually demolished in films like World Police, Category 7: The End of the World, Aftermath: Population Zero, GI Joe: The Rise of Cobra, and even Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs. The Sydney Opera House has also faced virtual ruin in X-Men: Apocalypse, Godzilla: Final wars, and Mega Shark vs Mecha Shark.
However, these landmarks aren’t even the most frequently targeted. Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament have been reduced to rubble at least nine times, appearing in films like Reign of Fire, V for Vendetta, and London Has Fallen. The Golden Gate Bridge fares no better, suffering destruction in at least 13 films, including Superman, San Andreas, and terminator: Genisys.
The undisputed champion of on-screen destruction, however, is the Statue of Liberty. It has been targeted in a staggering list of films: The Last War, Planet of the Apes, National Lampoon’s European Vacation, Superman IV: The Quest for Peace, Batman Forever, Independence Day, Mars Attacks, Deep Impact, Aftershock: earthquake in New York, Artificial Intelligence, The day After Tomorrow, Category 7: The End of the World, Tom and jerry: The Fast & Furry, Superman II, Transformers, Cloverfield, NYC: Tornado Terror, 2012, and GI Joe: The rise of Cobra.
“This teaches us two things,” one analyst commented. “The first is that we’ve all clearly been sleeping on Tom & Jerry: The Fast & Furry. The second is that filmmakers desperately need to find new landmarks to explode.”
Interestingly, cinematic destruction hasn’t always focused on the globally recognizable. In 1925, Harry O Hoyt opted to destroy the Blue Posts pub in Soho during a dinosaur-themed film. More recently, Alfonso Cuarón chose Bexhill-on-Sea as the backdrop for devastation in Children of Men. Even Marvel demonstrated a degree of inventiveness, staging a major battle sequence in Captain America: Civil War at Leipzig airport.
A call for greater creativity is growing. Instead of the same tired landmarks, why not target the Spam Museum in Austin, Minnesota, during an alien invasion? Or the Manneken Pis statue in Brussels during a nuclear crisis? The question isn’t if landmarks will be destroyed in film, but which landmarks. After all, as one critic pointed out, “we’ve seen meteors hit Earth a million times before, but have any of them ever taken out the Cleethorpes Coast Light Railway? No, and this is precisely why cinema is dying.”
