Movie's Ice Age example essay topic

The movie, The Day After Tomorrow, addresses the issue of global warming. The movie's portrayal of the events caused by global warming was extreme and not very believable. Some of the information is backed up by science but most is completely off the wall and non realistic. The movie cited the cause of the global climate change to be the rise in temperature due to greenhouse gasses.

The warmer temperatures caused the polar ice caps to melt, and the increased amount of freshwater in the ocean disrupted the North Atlantic Current. The North Atlantic Current is what is responsible for the warm temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere. With the current disrupted the Northern Hemisphere went into an ice age. In real life, the polar ice caps are melting, but at a rate not even close to that of the one represented in the movie.

Even if the ice was melting at a quicker rate, the chance that it would throw off the North Atlantic Current is slim to none. Also, there is no way that the ice would melt so quickly that a change that drastic would be made. Another major issue I had with the movie was its temperature inconsistencies. In the movie, scientists warned people about going outside. They say that if one was to go outside that they would freeze to death. The movie also showed a wool mammoth which froze to death immediately at the time of the first ice age.

These examples were placed in the movie to highlight the extreme temperature and its danger. But throughout the course of the movie, there are points where people are merely wearing a turtleneck and a light jacket. The wool mammoth is a large animal which was accustomed to low temperatures. If this animal froze immediately than a human surely would, especially if they were wearing nothing more than a turtleneck. Other scenes in the movie show humans frozen to death, and then others are standing there with nothing wrong.

With temperatures as low as they were supposed to be in the movie, the people who were still alive would have a horrible case of frostbite. In the movie, there was no frost bite to be seen. The temperature inconsistencies were glaring in the movie and made it seem incredibly unrealistic. There were also scenes in the movie where the characters are outrunning the freeze. There is no possible way a person could outrun temperature. There is also no way a person could survive temperatures that low.

The temperature was so low that everything was immediately freezing, including flags and buildings. There is no way that a human could possibly survive a temperature that low. There were some other things that bothered me about the movie, such as the isolation of the "ice age" The movie's ice age was specifically isolated to the northern hemisphere. Americans were able to seek refuge from the storm by merely crossing the border into Mexico.

So the storm wasn't even isolated to the Northern Hemisphere, or even North America, it was only in the US and Canada. If there was such a drastic climate change, a simple move to Mexico wouldn't ensure anyone's safety. The ocean played a large role in the unrealistic nature of this movie. The ocean in the movie rose at least 25 ft, if not more than that, in a very short period of time.

It usually takes years for the ocean to raise a distinct amount, not minutes or hours. There is no possible way that amount of water which supposedly entered the ocean from the polar ice caps could create a rise in the ocean so quickly. Even if that amount of water did enter, it would be a gradual rise over time. To melt as quickly as the ice did, the temperature on earth would be far too high and be unbearable. Also, there was a wall of water that pushed its way toward New York and through the streets of the city. Nothing occurred to cause the tidal wave.

The only thing that happened was the rise in water level, but that wouldn't create a wave like that. The North Atlantic Ocean is the only place that the water level had apparently raised. There is no mention of high water in the south, or anything along those lines. There is also a shot of the Rio Grande, and the water level in it is incredibly low, as it usually is. If the storms were as bad as shown, or the ocean's water level had risen so much than the water level in the Rio Grande would have done the same. It would not have remained at its typically low level.

In the movie, the ocean froze enough that people could walk on it. The salt in the ocean lowers the freezing point far below that of pure water. The Earth's temperature would need to be incredibly low to freeze the ocean. Humans would not be able to survive temperatures this low. At the end of the movie, there is a shot of the Earth taken from space. In this shot, the majority of the US and Canada are covered with ice and snow, but it is clearly defined lines.

It does not show the frozen ocean which was covered by layers of snow. This is yet another inconsistency. I could go on forever on all the things in the movie which did not match up correctly, but I'm not going to. Though the movie is slightly exaggerated, there are some parts which are backed by science.

The North Atlantic Current is in fact a crucial part of life on Earth. It is also true that global warming is an issue created from human pollution, and that global warming is causing polar icecaps to melt. It is a pity that the movie isn't more believable because it could be used as a platform to help make people aware of environmental issues..