Disaster-Porn Movies

It's as perverse a desire as any: wanting to watch the very world we live in get blown to smithereens. But year after year, the general public forks out millions of dollars to see New York City get pummelled by a tidal wave, or a small farming town eviscerated by a tornado. Disaster films satisfy some deep-seeded primitive yearning within us with the explosions, loud bangs, and heart-pounding adrenaline.

For 2009, and on Friday the 13th no less, the mother of all disaster films, '2012', is being released. It promises to be a veritable orgy of cataclysmic cacophony, replete with melodrama and hammy acting. If this kind of flick is your bag, we suggest the following epic disaster films.

'The Day After Tomorrow' - Suspend your disbelief and strap yourself in for this fear-mongering film about global warming. Father (Dennis Quaid) and son (Jake Gyllenhaal) are convinced the end of the world is nigh, but no one wants to listen to them, despite the increasingly apocalyptic weather patterns occurring all over the globe. You wanna see tornadoes rip apart a city? A gigantic tidal wave flooding Manhattan? A sudden deep freeze that Gyllenhaal and Quaid mysteriously survive? Then check this one out.

'Armageddon' - In 1998, this movie was all the rage. Starring Bruce Willis, Ben Affleck, and Liv Tyler, the movie focuses on an elite group of astronauts sent into space to break up/destroy a giant asteroid hurtling towards Earth. There's a lot of melodrama and tears, not to mention a Kleenex moment when the space crew has to make a life-or-death decision towards the end of the film. Bruce Willis still rules, though.

'Deep Impact' - Meet 'Armageddon's lower-budget cousin. Also featuring a gigantic meteor heading towards Earth, this film is more family-focused and less about a space mission. Elijah Wood and Leelee Sobieski battle through teenage emotion, Tea Leoni works through some intense Daddy issues, and President Morgan Freeman does his best to guide his wayward country through the crisis.

'Outbreak' - For those of you more interested in the sickness kind of apocalypse, this genuinely scary-and-gross movie focuses on an unknown virus spreading through Small Town, USA. Dustin Hoffman and Rene Russo make up the central couple (yeah, it was a different time), who are newly-divorced and still at odds over the mysterious illness. The real scene-stealer in this film? The little monkey who infects thousands of people.

Honourable Mentions: 'Independence Day,' 'Volcano,' '28 Days Later,' 'Knowing'