Q&A USA

감독: Roland Emmerich

주연: Dennis Quaid/Jake Gyllenhaal/Ian Holm/Emmy Rossum/Sela Ward

The Coming Global Superstorm 책을 기본으로 만든 영화로, 남극에서 빙하 코어를 탐사하던 기후학자인 잭 홀박사는 지구에 이상변화가 일어날 것을 감지하고  국제회의에서 지구의 기온 하락 변화에 관한 연구발표를 하게 된다. 급격한 지구 온난화로 남극, 북극의 빙하가 녹아 바닷물이 차가워지면서 해류의 흐름이 바뀌게 되고 결국 지구 전체가 빙하로 뒤덮이는 거대한 재앙이 올 것이라고 경고 발표와 지구가 대재앙에 휩싸이는 story.  

Jack Hall, an American paleoclimatologist, and his colleagues Frank and Jason, drill for ice-core samples in the Larsen Ice Shelf for the NOAA, when the shelf breaks apart. Jack warns of impending global warming at a UN conference in New Delhi, but US Vice President Raymond Becker dismisses his concerns. Professor Terry Rapson, an oceanographer of the Hedland Centre in Scotland befriends Jack over his views of an inevitable climate shift. When several buoys in the Atlantic Ocean show a severe ocean temperature drop, Rapson concludes Jack's theories are correct. Jack's and Rapson's teams, along with NASA meteorologist Janet Tokada, build a forecast model based on Jack's research.

A massive storm system develops in the northern hemisphere, splitting into three gigantic hurricane-like superstorms above Canada, Scotland, and Siberia. The storms pull frozen air from the upper troposphere into their center, flash-freezing anything caught in their eyes with temperatures below −150 degrees Fahrenheit (−101 degrees Celsius). Meanwhile, the weather worsens across the world; Tokyo is struck by a giant hail storm, sea levels in Nova Scotia rise 25 feet (7 meters) in seconds, and Los Angeles is devastated by a tornado outbreak. Following this, President Blake issues an executive order for the FAA to ground all air traffic across the country.

In New York City, Jack's son Sam, and his friends Brian Parks and Laura Chapman participate in an academic decathlon, where they meet new friend JD. New York is soon caught in the North American storm and the weather becomes progressively more violent, resulting in a massive storm surge flooding Manhattan. This forces Sam's group to seek shelter at the New York Public Library, but not before Laura accidentally cuts her leg. While cellphone communications are down, Sam is able to contact Jack and his mother Lucy, a physician, through a working payphone; Jack advises him to stay inside and promises to rescue him. Rapson and his team perish in the European storm. Lucy remains in a hospital caring for bed-ridden children, where she and her patients are eventually rescued by the authorities.

Upon Jack's suggestion, Blake orders the southern states to be evacuated into Mexico; the northern half are doomed to be hit by the superstorm, but are warned by the government to seek shelters and stay warm. With the storm having now reached Washington, Blake perishes after his motorcade is caught in it, making Becker the new President. Jack, Jason, and Frank make their way to New York against all odds. In Pennsylvania, Frank falls through the skylight of a mall, cutting his rope to prevent his friends from falling in after him. In the library, most survivors, upon seeing many survivors from other structures deciding to head south after the floodwater outside freezes over, decide to follow suit in spite of Sam's warnings, and are later found frozen to death by Jack and Jason; only a few survivors end up taking heed of Sam's advice to stay put, burning books to stay warm as the temperatures plunge.

Laura develops blood poisoning from her injury, whereupon Sam, Brian, and JD scour a Russian cargo vessel that had drifted into the city for penicillin, fending off a pack of wolves which escaped from Central Park Zoo. The eye of the North American storm arrives, freezing Manhattan solid, but Sam's group make it inside just in time. Likewise, Jack and Jason take shelter in an abandoned Wendy's restaurant. Days later, the superstorms dissipate. Jack and Jason successfully reach the library, finding Sam's group alive.

Becker, in his first address as President, apologizes on television for his ignorance, vowing to send helicopters to rescue survivors in the northern states. Jack and Sam's group are picked up in Manhattan, where many people have survived. On the International Space Station, astronauts look down in awe at the transformed surface of the Earth, now with ice caps extending across the northern hemisphere.