Released: June 2013
Directors: Seth Rogen & Evan Goldberg
Rated R
Run Time: 107 Minutes
Distributor: Columbia Pictures
Cast:
James Franco: James Franco
Seth Rogen: Seth Rogen
Jonah Hill: Jonah Hill
Jay Baruchel: Jay Baruchel
Danny McBride: Danny McBride
Craig Robinson: Craig Robinson
Michael Cera: Michael Cera
Emma Watson: Emma Watson
Rihanna: Rihanna
Kevin Hart: Kevin Hart
Writing a review for a comedy is a rather difficult thing to do. Why? Humor is an extremely subjective thing. What one person finds absolutely hilarious, another person thinks it painful to listen to or watch. I generally don’t like straight-up comedies, because they mostly don’t work for me. It usually forced and painfully obvious that they’re TRYING to make people laugh. The secret to good comedy is that the humor has to be natural. It has to flow naturally. It’s not that comedies don’t work, but some of the best comedies generally poke fun at pop culture and how people react to certain situations. This is why I love Mel Brook’s movies or the Airplane films. They are well-written, and the cast have really good timing. That’s also another issue that crops up when it comes to comedies: Timing. Timing is everything in comedy, whether it’s on film or in a club. If you don’t get the timing right, the joke or whatever you’re lampooning falls flat. Then again, some people just don’t have a sense of humor because they have no soul….you know, like gingers. I’m no theologian, but I’m pretty sure that’s the case. In any event, I’m reviewing a comedy that come out back in 2013 called This Is The End. Sounds pretty apocalyptic, no?
The film starts out with Jay Baruchel arriving in Los Angeles to hang out with his best friend, Seth Rogen. After spending most of the day at Rogen’s house, they go to James Franco’s house for a crazy house-warming party that’s loaded with celebrities like Rihanna, Emma Watson and Michael Cera. A couple of hours later, Jay and Seth go to a local store to pick up some cigarettes when they see people being sucked up into the sky by blue beams of light. With total chaos in the streets they race back to Franco’s house where a giant hole opens up in the ground with some of the party goers like Kevin Hart falling into it. Also, Michael Cera gets impaled by a light pole. Rarely has a movie death been so satisfying and so damned funny. A handful of survivors decide to hold up in Franco’s house to wait for rescue. Later, they realize that the apocalypse is happening because Jay reads about it in the bible. So what do these guys do when the world is ending? They party like it’s on sale for 19.99. Then Danny McBride shows up, and all hell breaks loose……literally. This is not your typical comedy. They throw in a lot of special effects, some gore and a fairly serious look at what would happen if the Rapture was real.
The first thing you should notice when you read this review is the cast list. They are all playing themselves….in a manner of speaking. They are playing caricatures of themselves, meaning they are playing up the most ridiculous parts of their film work and it’s absolutely hilarious. James Franco is behaving like a 14-year old girl, Michael Cera as the womanizing coke-head, and Danny McBride as a super-douchebag. Part of what really makes this movie work IS the cast. They are all friends, so the chemistry between the lot of them is natural, and that is what makes the comedy genuine. Now, the comedy gets pretty dirty. There’s a lot of sex, fart and rape jokes to go around. Before anybody jumps my shit because I said “rape jokes,” let me explain: Rape is not funny in most, if not all situations. People tend to get really butt-hurt about that. Before anybody tells me: Yes, I’m going to Hell. This is NOT a foregone conclusion. In all seriousness, though, the context in which rape is discussed is the hilarious part, not the act itself. Although, seeing Jonah Hill getting raped by Satan is a….well, bizarre thing to see, because that’s how he gets possessed. Yes, Jonah Hill gets possessed. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to look at Jonah Hill and Satan the same way again. If you haven’t figured it out yet, This Is The End is a bit of a send-up of established horror and disaster movies.
Now, the whole film is not all yuk-yuks, as there is some seriously violent stuff happening throughout the movie. We see a guy getting his head ripped off by something we don’t see. This leads to a hilarious situation where people are kicking the poor guy’s head around like a soccer ball. There are some genuinely thrilling moments here. When Jay and Craig “volunteer” to go a nearby house for supplies, they end up running into a demon. I have to give the film-makers credit, the demons and creature effects are astounding. The demons are CGI, but they are well-designed and look genuinely threatening. The 100-foot tall version of Satan is incredible and……well-endowed.
Is This Is The End offensive? Absolutely, if you’re religiously sensitive. But it’s not the first movie to jab religion in the eye. Movies have been doing that for a long time. One of the most entertaining of which, is Kevin Smith’s Dogma. You want to talk about religiously insensitive? That one takes the cake. While This Is The End definitely pokes fun at the whole religious aspect of the end of the world, it also has a fairly thoughtful look at how people should behave in case the Rapture should happen. The movie is absolutely bonkers and I definitely recommend it. 9/10 is what I give this one.