John Cusack names his favourite disaster movies: “Even the metaphysical mind-benders”
What qualifies as a disaster movie is up for debate, but one thing that can be agreed upon is that John Cusack has hardly been a mainstay of the genre. He is better known for spending his years in quirky dramedies like 16 Candles, Stand by Me, Tower Records, Grosse Point Blank and too many others to list. There are so many, in fact, that we can’t really call them ‘quirky’ anymore, given that they’re as mainstream as any other genre. But what qualifies as a ‘disaster film’, something outside Cusack’s usual oeuvre?
According to Cusack in an interview about breaking his typecasting, trying new things, and choosing to star in Roland Emmerich’s 2012, a film about the (now defunct) eschatological theory predicting the titular year to be the last on earth–he thinks a disaster film is something ‘dealing with the end’.
He has some interesting picks for his favourite disaster movies, though, relaying, “Yeah, I mean, I loved The Towering Inferno and The Poseidon Adventure… all those films from the ’70s. I was always a big fan. And I like the post-apocalyptic movies, too – the really obscure ones, like A Boy and His Dog.”
Cusack goes on to say: “And that one was sort of a precursor to Mad Max and The Road Warrior; I’m sure it influenced George Miller. And even the metaphysical mind-benders, stuff like The Exorcist. Really, those are all dealing with the end — an apocalypse of some sort.” Depending on who you ask, the Mad Max films might be more ‘post-apocalyptic’ as the ‘end’ has already happened, but who wants to split the hairs on Mel Gibson’s mullet?
For Cusack’s venture into the genre, however you may define it, 2012 wasn’t exactly beloved by fans of the genre. Or anyone. The film got mediocre reviews, and – apart from a few dissenting critics who thought it might be a portent of things to come (they were wrong) – it was generally considered to be rote and pointless despite a healthy box office. In terms of sheer spectacle, though, the film was praised. The effects were arresting, and John Cusack was… well, John Cusack. At the end of the world.
Cusack is a bit of a cinephile with profuse opinions about films in every genre, though. For someone who specialises in playing the absent-minded everyman who courts women far, far out of his league, he seems interested in integrating that character into whatever film interests him across the spectrum of generic slots we place said films in.
The guy has a certain type range, though. At least extending to the flavour of the movies he’s willing to accept. While not quite a renaissance man who becomes every character he plays, he boasts an impressive filmography across movies as diverse as, well, the ones that you’re thinking of, but also playing Edgar Allen Poe in 2012’s The Raven (we had realised the world wasn’t ending quite yet) and an even darker turn in 2003’s slasher film Identity.
