Movie :: Geostorm (2017)

Credit:
- IMDB
- Wikipedia

Geostorm is a 2017 American disaster film[1] co-written, produced, and directed by Dean Devlin as his feature film directorial debut. The film stars Gerard Butler, Jim Sturgess, Abbie Cornish, Alexandra Maria Lara, Richard Schiff, Robert Sheehan, Daniel Wu, Eugenio Derbez, Ed Harris, and Andy García. The plot follows a satellite designer who tries to save the world from a storm of epic proportions caused by malfunctioning climate-controlling satellites.

Plot:
Following a series of extreme natural disasters, an international coalition commissions "Dutch Boy", a system of satellites designed to control climate on a global scale. After Dutch Boy neutralizes a massive typhoon before it can hit Shanghai, a Senate sub-committee reprimands chief architect Jake Lawson for activating the satellites without prior approval and replaces him with his brother Max, who works under Secretary of State Leonard Dekkom.

Three years later, a United Nations field team stationed in Afghanistan comes across a frozen village. Simultaneously, an engineer working on the International Climate Space Station (ICSS) steals data from the Afghanistan satellite moments before being ejected into space. U.S. President Andrew Palma calls an emergency meeting of his Cabinet after learning about the Afghanistan incident and, after Max demands they conduct a proper investigation, agrees with Dekkom's suggestion to send Jake. Max travels to Cocoa Beach, Florida, and convinces Jake to investigate. Another satellite causes temperatures in Hong Kong to increase, resulting in a firestorm that nearly kills Max's college friend Cheng, who serves as head of Dutch Boy's Hong Kong department.

Jake arrives to ICSS to examine the satellite that decimated Hong Kong with station commander Ute Fassbinder and her crew. A malfunction damages the satellite and erase its data. Back on Earth, as a hailstorm levels Tokyo, Cheng discovers he has lost login access and warns Max of global cataclysm known as "Geostorm" if the malfunction continues. Max discovers he cannot access the satellites and his login access has been deliberately revoked. Cheng flies to the United States after evading a team of armed mercenaries.

Jake and Ute fly outside the ICSS to retrieve a hard drive which had been ejected along with the satellite engineer. They keep the hard drive secret from the crew, suspecting a traitor. Jake and Ute look for the source of the error but are blocked. Jake reports the findings to Max. The ICSS staff attempt to neutralize malfunctioning satellites by deliberately knocking them offline via collisions with replacement satellites. After Cheng tells Max of Project Zeus, an assailant intentionally causes Cheng's death in a traffic accident. Max and Dana discover Project Zeus simulates extreme weather patterns to create the biggest Geostorm.

Jake, Ute, and fellow crew member Dussette recover the copied log data from the dead engineer and discover a virus has systematically wiped out everyone's login access to that satellite. Jake suspects the President is behind the attack and is using Dutch Boy as a weapon. He tells Max he needs to reboot the system, which requires the kill code, held by the President. Max asks Sarah, his girlfriend and a Secret Service agent, to help him to acquire it.

During the Democratic National Convention in Orlando, Max discovers Orlando is next in line for a superstorm. He requests Dekkom to help secure the kill code from the President, but Dekkom instead tries to kill Max, unveiling himself as the saboteur. Max escapes and immediately informs Sarah. He and Sarah "kidnap" President Palma to protect him from other service members potentially with Dekkom and secure the kill code. They save Palma and escape from the stadium before a lightning storm destroys it. After outsmarting Dekkom's mercenaries, Max and Sarah confront him about his intentions as he's arrested: to wipe out all of America's "enemies", take out the line of succession, and dominate the world.

Onboard the ICSS, the team loses control of all operations and is forced to watch the virus initiate the self-destruct program. As cities around the world are devastated by natural disasters, Jake realizes software engineer Duncan is responsible and confronts him. In the ensuing scuffle, Duncan accidentally ejects himself into space while Jake escapes. As the crew evacuates, Jake stays behind to ensure the reboot completes. Max and Sarah escort the President to Kennedy Space Center, where it is revealed that, while the Geostorm can be stopped, the kill code cannot stop the self-destruct process.

Ute stays behind to help Jake reboot the system, transferring satellite control to NASA and preventing the Geostorm. The two take shelter in a replacement satellite as the self-destruction sequence completes and signal for a nearby shuttle to pick them up. Six months later, Jake works as the head engineer for a new system of satellites, which is now administered by an international committee.