For centuries, mankind has been plundering the riches of the planet, only to contaminate the atmosphere.

Enough already.

In Roland Emmerich's The Day After Tomorrow, Mother Nature fights back.

At first, it's a few natural disasters such as hail storms in Japan, snow storms in India, hurricanes in Florida, tornadoes in L.A. and tidal waves of the coast of New York.

Mother Nature is saving the best, or in this case, the worst for last. She's bringing in a new Ice Age and that means temperatures plummeting so fast, airplanes drop from the sky, skin freezes on contact with the

air, lakes and rivers turn to ice and cities are buried under ice and snow.

Canada is wiped out near the beginning of the second hour of the flick as small groups of desperate New Yorkers huddle together to survive the deep freeze the Northern Hemisphere has become.

Emmerich, who turned aliens loose on mankind in 1996 in Independence Day and then let Godzilla loose on New York two years later, knows how to create a sense of panic and impending doom.

It's his forte and he is at his eye-popping, mind-boggling best with The Day After Tomorrow in the first hour of this new disaster flick.

His special effects team makes the ripping apart of the polar ice cap seem terrifyingly real, as are the storms in Japan and Florida.

Emmerich has great fun ravaging L.A. with tornadoes as he decimates famous landmarks, and the tidal wave that turns New York into a fish bowl is spectacular. In the second hour, Emmerich makes the thrills more personal and therefore more chilling.

There is no escape for certain characters.

They become casualties of Mother Nature's revenge. Together, the heart-pounding thrills of the first half, combined with the heartwarming thrills of the second, work to keep viewers glued to the edge of their seats.

At the centre of this global disaster is the Hall family.

Jack Hall (Dennis Quaid) is a climatologist who tries to warn the world of the impending disaster. That means Quaid's major function is to explain what's happening and why.

Lucy Hall (Sela Ward) is a doctor at a cancer hospital. Her concerns are not with all of humanity but with her patients.

Their son (Jake Gyllenhaal) is smitten with fellow college student Laura Chapman (Emmy Rossum) and they find themselves representing their school at a scholastic tournament in New York.

When Jack learns that Sam is trapped in a library in New York, he sets out from Washington to save him.

When the ice moves in, it's every family for themselves.

Next to the special effects, Gyllenhaal is the best thing about Tomorrow.

Before disaster strikes, he's the sarcastic pessimist desperate to find some way to make his intentions known to the girl he fancies. When New York freezes over, he takes over and becomes the hero -- and a most convincing one at that.

The Day After Tomorrow is good old-fashioned popcorn entertainment that delivers all the fun and thrills it promises.

(This film is rated PG)

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