It's Fudgement Day!

Rating: 6/10 (14 November 2013)

"This Is the End" was probably the comedy movie of this summer. A quality cast all playing themselves and how they deal with an apocalyptic scenario got millions of people into theaters as a valid alternative to open-air baths. I thought this film was 100 minutes of escapism at its best. I laughed a lot at one-liners, situation comedy and particularly those scenes in which the stars make fun of themselves, like right at the beginning when Rogen gets sort of bullied by an overambitious interviewer about how he always plays the same character.
The story is told quickly. Old friends Jay Baruchel and Seth Rogen reunite for a weekend of fun. One of their activities besides playing video games and smoking weed is going to a big party at James Franco's house. Unfortunately, at the same time the apocalypse begins. The movie has a lot of serious sub-plot lines, stuff about God, changing friendships and moral decency, but it's always with a funny undertone. So this is 100% comedy, well maybe a few percent sci-fi, but never really seriously dramatic. A lot of it made me laugh, but nothing really stayed in the mind, except maybe the scene in which Franco seems to rise to the heavens, then goes nuts and goes back down again. Here and there, there's a couple things that could have been done better. First of all, it's a massive sausage fest with short cameos by Mindy Kaling, Rihanna and Emma Watson. The latter should have had a bigger part perhaps, although I felt sorry enough for her already with the little screen time she had here and I wouldn't really want to imagine how a female could bear with these boys for half an hour of the film or longer. The rape talk was also one of the many funny wtf moments I had. Others would be Jonah Hill as a zombie or everything involving Michael Cera in the first 20 minutes.
Performance-wise, nobody was really on awards-worthy level. The writing is the best aspect about it. From the cast, my personal favorite was Danny McBride I guess. He was almost the oldest of the bunch (behind Robinson), but also the funniest. His line delivery was as hilarious as his actions, like when he tried to kill them all not knowing it wasn't a real gun. The special effects, especially the monsters, weren't too shabby either given this was actually not really a fantasy/superhero film. All in all, it was quite an entertaining movie with many interesting contemporary references (Gangnam style etc.). It's nothing I'd be too eager to see anytime soon again, but if you like stuff like "The Hangover" and take it for what it is and don't go in it with too big expectations, you'll have a good time.