This movie here, 'This is the End', is
testament to the raw Hollywood power of one Seth Rogen.
I imagine my man sitting around with his boy Evan Goldberg…
both stoned no doubt… and saying 'Let's make a movie!'
And then calling up their friends, deciding not to play actual
characters but amped up versions of themselves, with the only
thing missing being a script. And while there was a
script for 'The is the End', at least in the sense that the
characters were speaking words and the movie did have a
beginning, middle and end, I'm thinking it served mostly as a
guide for these actors to freely express profanities,
vulgarities, and lob offensive softballs at one another.
And this cat got this movie made and released. Did this
work? Like a charm.
James Franco (as played by James Franco) is having a house
warming party. He's invited his good friend Seth Rogen
(Rogen) who happens to be hosting his fellow Canadian, Los
Angeles hating homeboy Jay Baruchel (Jay Baruchel). Jay
hates L.A., he hates the people in L.A., and he hates the
people who are going to be at his party at Franco's, but Seth
is his boy so he goes along.
What a party it is. How can a brother get on an invite
list and slip into one of these vacuous, pointless, sinful
Hollywood parties? And just so you know, while this
movie is pretty funny for the most part, thirty years from now
the main thing people will remember from this movie is coked
out Michael Cera from 'This is the End'. Anyway, Jay
doesn't like the party because, well, Jay is sort of a
jerk. He's mean to Jonah (Jonah Hill), he disrespects
Craig (Craig Robinson) and Emma (Emma Watson) by disrespecting
'Forest Gump', and he's just a general all-around stick in the
mud.
Then, with Jay and Seth were at a
quickie-mart, the apocalypse begins. People are sucked
in the sky by pretty blue lights, the earth opens up, the
mountains catch fire and back at Franco's crib, people of
varying star-power are sucked into a fiery pit. Kevin
Hart kicking Aziz Ansari in the face… comedy gold right
there. And we like Aziz.
Ultimately, with most of the people at Franco's party now
dead, Jay, Seth, Franco, Craig and Jonah have boarded
themselves in Franco's house trying to figure out what to do
next. Also at the party, though he didn't get an invite,
is Danny McBride (Danny McBride), and apparently there was a
reason James didn't invite this guy. Regardless, Jay is
trying to tell these people that it's the end of days and
judgment is upon them, but they're not believers. Not
yet. Until then, they might as well keep themselves
occupied with stuff, like say make a sequel to 'Pineapple
Express' with Franco's camcorder from '127 Hours'.
Eventually Jay's theory is brought to bear, the blue light
people were the just and righteous, taken in The Rapture, and
now our actors are sad that they were Left Behind. And
all heck has broken out in the house. Largely due to the
existence of Danny McBride. But if you've read
revelations… and mind you I think writers Rogen and Goldberg
read just enough to get by for their story… but if you've read
it, you know that we will have a second chance to ascend when
the end of days comes. Can our actors redeem themselves
and ascend to Heaven? Note that if the Christian canon
is important to you to the point you can't laugh at it just a
little bit… by all means… watch another movie.
As you might imagine, 'This is the End' is completely
tasteless. There are no restrictions, nothing is off
limits, it is clear no one associated with this film has any
idea of what the word 'maturity' means, and this is a movie
that would literally sell its soul to the devil himself, if
this movie had a soul, to get a laugh. Channing Tatum
shows up in this movie. A friend of mine has a very
unhealthy dislike of Mr. Tatum. Until he saw him in this
movie, and now he's his favorite actor. It was better
for Channing Tatum when my good friend didn't like him.
I could only imagine what Channing Tatum could've done to make
this friend do such a 180 on his opinion of Channing. My
imagination wasn't great enough. I was somewhat
surprised that I saw more CGI giant penises in this movie than
authentic breasts in this film… but then this is a sophomoric
bromance comedy made by sophomoric boys, so I guess I really
shouldn't be surprised by this.
As with most machine gun style comedies such as this, where
the jokes come fast and furious, not every gag is going to hit
its funnybone target, and I do believe that one's ultimate
enjoyment of this film will be variably aligned to one's
fandom of the actors in this movie. If you happen to be
a big Seth Rogen fan… chances are this could very well be the
best movie you've ever seen. If you sit around asking
yourself 'how in the hell did Seth Rogen become a movie star?'
you're enjoyment will undoubtedly be considerably less.
A coked out Michael Cera? Funny whether you are a fan or
not.
Personally, I thought 'This was the End' was funny.
Painfully so at times, rarer times just plain painful.
And sure, I'm in the camp that would rather see real breast
than giant CGI penises, but that's just a personal
preference.
