Review By: Marcus Flewellen
About fifteen minutes into “This is the End,” the best comedy of the year so far, the end begins. Seth Rogen and Jay Baruchel (played by Seth Rogen and Jay Baruchel, respectively) have just left a wild, star-studded housewarming party hosted by James Franco (also playing himself). Now they’re in a convenience store looking to buy a pack of cigarettes. Suddenly, a massive earthquake hits Los Angeles. Several beams of blue light descend from above and hit all the other customers in the store, lifting them into heaven. The only people left in the store are Seth, Jay, and the crabby old store manager, who is killed almost instantly. Seth and Jay (naturally) freak out, and then run as fast as they can to Franco’s house, trying their best to dodge all the chaos that surrounds them. Buildings are falling. Demons are flying across the sky. The iconic Hollywood sign is on fire. This is hell on earth. This is the Rapture. This is the end.
Co-written and co-directed by Rogen and his frequent writing partner Evan Goldberg, “This is the End” is a rare horror comedy that manages to blend both genres seamlessly; the film manages to be incredibly hilarious and truly terrifying, sometimes in the same scene. The film reminded me of the 2004 cult classic “This is the End,” another successful comedy/horror mash-up. If you love “Shaun,” you’ll love this film too.
Every actor in the film is playing a heightened version of their public personas: Rogen is the foulmouthed stoner he plays in all of his films; Baruchel is a nerdy hipster who’s anti-Hollywood; Franco is a sexually ambiguous narcissist, etc. When Seth and Jay get back to Franco’s house, they arrive just in time to witness their friends – and most of young Hollywood – die comically gruesome deaths. (Michael Cera, Kevin Hart, Mindy Kaling and Rihanna are among the unlucky.) When it’s all said and done, only Rogen, Baruchel, Franco, Jonah Hill, Danny McBride and Craig Robinson (“The Office”) are alive. They decide to hide from the apocalypse in Franco’s gaudy mansion and wait for help to arrive.
From there, the film evolves into a six-actor play. As the actors wait for someone to rescue them, they smoke weed, make a sequel to Pineapple Express, make fun of each other, drive each other insane. Rogen, Baruchel, Franco, Hill, McBride and Robinson are all clearly having a blast here making fun of themselves, each other and some of their previous films, and the script – smartly – pulls no punches. (Am I the only one who liked “The Green Hornet”?)
The film’s not perfect. There are way too many gross-out gags involving bodily fluids here. I know that lowbrow humor is a staple of these types of films, but it’s completely unnecessary and comes across as incredibly lazy. There’s too much great material here for Rogen and Goldberg to feel like they have to use lowest common denominator humor. The ending – the final five minutes or so — is also a bit of a disappointment.
But when “This is the End” is firing on all cylinders – which is for most of the film’s 105-minute running time – it’s smarter, funnier and sharper than any other comedy in recent memory. I rarely ask for a sequel, but I really want to see “This is the End 2.” Or “Pineapple Express 2: Blood Red.”
