Poseidon (12A) <!-- none onestar twostar threestar fourstar fivestar -->

In the week that United 93 comes out, this disaster remake looks even more inconsequential than it would ordinarily have done. High seas specialist Wolfgang Petersen once made Das Boot, the best ever submarine movie, but he also made The Perfect Storm, and it's that CGI overkill to which Poseidon clings. When a freak wave capsizes a luxury cruise liner (and cuts short some gratingly naff New Year celebrations), a band of passengers decides to climb through the bowels of the ship before it sinks. Kurt Russell and Josh Lucas lead the attempt, the former an ex-fireman, the latter an ex-Navy man, and there's a champion swimmer on the team, too. Couldn't they have had a few regular people unqualified to deal with maritime calamity? There are a few frights, but nothing can dispel its air of tawdry contrivance.