This Is the End (2013)
Ending Summer 2013
I'm gonna be honest here - I don't generally watch this kind of movie, because it's normally not my cup of humor. That being said, this one looked like it would make fun of all the right stuff, so it had to at least merit a few chuckles right? The thing I didn't take into account is that a movie such as this might not have a huge heavy duty plot line, meaning I may not be able to milk three paragraphs out of it - so it probably would have been a safer bet to do a Quick Flick on it instead - but alas, it is in fact the weekly movie, and you are probably wishing this preamble would come to an end. Does the movie end my worries, or does it end the patience of the movie watcher instead?
Seth Rogan's friend Jay swings in to LA to visit for a while. They start the day off in the way they both would classify as the best - smoking weed, eating munchies, and watching some 3d tv. When night rolls around though, Rogan pitches that they should go to buddy Franco's housewarming party - to which Jay isn't particularly keen, as he doesn't really like anyone there and doesn't want to just get bailed on by Rogan when they get there. Rogan promises he won't bail on him though, so it's decided that they will indeed go to the party.
The party is just a mess of celebrities getting drunk and doing drugs, as anyone would anticipate, and after running into a few people, Jay goes outside for a smoke. After numerous smokes, Jay and Rogan go to a nearby gas station to pick up some more, and as they are there the start of the end begins. A sudden earthquake breaks the windows and topples over shelving, and folks start getting beamed up into the sky by blue lights. It's quickly decided that they should go back to Franco's house, to which they hurriedly make their way through the chaos and destruction happening. In a humorous twist, the party is still going as normal inside of Franco's house, with nobody having noticed anything weird at all. As Jay is trying to explain what he saw, another earthquake shakes the house and the assembled party runs outside to see what's going on.
Outside, things aren't very good. Fires roll on the Hollywood Hill, and a massive sinkhole opens on the lawn, sucking in countless party-goers. A handful (that will end up being our cast for most the movie) make their way back into the house, and through a handy use of the television find out that things are getting worse, and people should stay inside and beware rioters. The crew then tries to take stock of all their supplies, and set up going about maximizing survivability until they get rescued, which is ruined the next morning when a party crasher wakes up and cooks all their food. From here onwards, things progressively escalate, ranging from monsters outside, a misunderstanding with Emma Watson leading to their supply of water being taken, and even a demon possession! Will any of these fools make it out of the predicament alive?
This is your main cast, get used to seeing them.
The actors act like the actors would conceivably act, which is to say that you would believe that this is how they may act in their situation. I can't necessarily call it bad acting at any given point, outside of maybe calling out the fact that some of the characters feel as though they are still playing a role as opposed to being a normal everyday human - but then again, we don't often imagine actors being normal everyday humans do we? The humor goes along with the acting in a way - if you like the "stupid funny" kind of movies like Superbad, or many of the comedies that Seth Rogan appears in than the humor will be right there. For those not acquainted with the type, expect a lot of drugs, swearing, and phallical objects. There are a few moments that got me to chuckle, I won't lie, so I find it better than I did Superbad - but it's not exactly something that had me rolling on the floor laughing my butt off.
Costume department didn't have too much trouble here I would assume, considering the majority of attire is varying stages of a single outfit for each character. Theres a bit of practical work on make-up for a few scenes, but the larger scale of effects are in the digital realm. By now, anyone who's read a plethora of these opinions of mine know I prefer practical effects, but the monsters are all pretty impressive looking, coming in a couple of different forms that don't reveal themselves till most the way through the movie - which was a good move for suspense purposes. Of course, the major complaint there would be that I didn't need to see a godzilla-sized monster's lava wang flopping about, but it is that kind of movie after all, so I probably should have expected it.
Thematically speaking, there is a surprising deep bit of religious potential in there, although it never really feels all that preachy about it considering its more of the "must be the end of days" form of delivery than an actual serious manner. Still, that being said, it does bring out some points of strangeness in how the whole "entry to heaven" thing works, but even then they don't go into that enough to make it much of an issue. So it is there, and people could think deep about it, or they could try to attach to the whole friend dynamics and the likes presented, but at no point does the movie ever really feel like it cares to have you dwell on these things - it is a comedy after all.
Effects work is pretty good.
Would I recommend it? Nah. I mean, to be fair, there's a few people out there I may know who would actually really enjoy this, but unless that "stupid humor" (as I call it) is the kind of jokes that you actually enjoy, it's gonna fall a little flat. The movie is put together fine, the plot works, and by all means it is no way unenjoyable, but without a doubt theres gonna be people who just don't want to deal with all the immature humor types added in (what with the drugs, penis, and masturbation jokes). If you do find that humor enjoyable, then you'll probably enjoy it and it's rapture-apocalypse plot, but for the rest there are numerous moments when you'll be asking when that is gonna end and it gets back to being more enjoyable.