Rapture-Palooza

OK let me start off with a disclaimer. Being a raunchy comedy fan from Chicago, i am an unabashed Craig Robinson supporter. Dude paid his dues and routinely stole the show in bit parts in various Judd Apatow movies of the last decade. With that in mind, its nice to see Hollywood start to realize the mans considerable talents and start giving him some star vehicles that put them to use. never mind the god awful "Peeples", which was a failure more due to a horrific, unfunny script than Robinsons performance, Rapturepalooza is the movie that allows Robinsons irreverent, thoroughly raunchy comedic style to truly shine. I had tears in my eyes laughing out loud watching this movie. Granted the plot and premise serve as nothing more than a means to allow Robinson to go ape-sh#t with the material, its still not that bad. Anyone vaguely familiar with Revelations will recognize the subversive take on it and the pot addicted wraiths were pretty funny. That being said the main reason to see this movie is Craig Robinson. Hell change your view of what we were taught about the Antichrist..but in a rolling on the floor, tears in your eyes way... See this if your a fan of Pineapple express, Knocked Up and 40 year old virgin..

"The people who went to church and prayed and missed out on a lot of fun stuff got sucked straight to heaven. The rest of us, well we're screwed." While out bowling one night Lindsey (Kendrick) and her boyfriend Ben witness the rapture. When they get home they find out that both their moms have been taken while their fathers are still here. Trying to move on with their lives they start a food cart. When that doesn't work they take a job with the anti-Christ (Robinson), but with a hidden agenda. This is a movie I was excited about mainly because of the cast. I have to say that I thought this was very funny and I laughed throughout the whole movie, but it is my kind of humor. Mainly a lot of random things happening and some really stupid jokes that make me laugh like a man getting killed by a huge flaming rock and the wife mad because he was holding the eggs when he died. If that kind of humor appeals to you then watch this and laugh. If you are into more intelligent humor then you may not like this. Overall, a stupid movie that I thought was very funny and I laughed a lot. I give it a B+.

With a mediocre title like "Rapture-Palooza" the film cannot be accused of false advertising. With the exception of Anna Kendrick, the cast is peopled with comedic actors of "There's-That-Guy-From- That-Thing"-level renown which is about the right level for the material. You get the gist from the title that the plot amounts to it's the end of days and hilarity ensues. Although some of the proceedings are decidedly not funny including John Michael Higgins being crushed by a falling meteorite as the family looks on, drug- addicts pestering survivors for a hit as they leave their house and the deity of about a billion true-believers being burned to death with a laser as he rides a unicorn. Craig Robinson plays the Antichrist borrowing lines and an outrageous skeeviness from dozens of stand-up comedy routines over the last 30 years. Counter- intuitively his recycled slease-oid is by default the most fully realized character among those not played by Kendrick. Rob Coddry, Ken Jeong, John Francis Daly and others in the cast could have rotated around their interchangeable characters during the filming with little loss of coherence. In particular, Daly could have been replaced with a sock puppet on Kendrick's left hand and it would have played very similarly. As the movie meanders towards its anti- religious? ending, Kendrick inc increasingly comes to dominate the screen-time and brings an earnestness that keeps the movie at least watchable if not entertaining. In short, many better apocalypse films exist - watch one of those.

The movie does not pretend to be something it is not. Some may feel the ending fell flat and/or the actors seemed bored by the childish humor. I believe it was all very intentional.

The blatant absence of political correctness was, in my opinion, incredibly refreshing. Every now and then a good punch in the face is needed to wake up from incessant exposure to overly cautious censorship forced on us by societal standards. Words will only offend if they are allowed to do so.

Those who have a droll sense of humor, enjoy random comedy and do not have a tendency to take everything seriously, will find this entertaining. Then again, perhaps one must be exposed to copious amounts of idiocy and/or eye-rolling ignorance to fully enjoy such a dry, sarcastic treat. Whatever the case, if you can keep an open mind, I would certainly recommend this for a good laugh.

The summer of 2013 saw two big Rapture-themed comedies released, This Is the End and The World's End. Well, apparently, Rapture-Palooza was a third, but you probably never heard of it. It was actually released a few days before This Is the End in a few theaters, but it disappeared with little note and ended up on Netflix (is it even on video?). No surprise, really, as it isn't very good. It's not awful, though. Anna Kendrick stars, so it probably couldn't be really terrible. She and John Francis Daley (who played Sam Weir on Freaks and Geeks) star as a dorky young couple who stayed on Earth after the Rapture. Craig Robinson (who also co-starred in This Is the End) plays the Antichrist. When he catches sight of Kendrick, he falls for her, so she and Daley decide to put an end to him. There are actually a good handful of big laughs here, but for every joke that works there are at least two that don't. It seems to fall back on random swearing when things start to slow down (Craig Robinson is particularly disappointing here, since that seems to be his whole schtick). That said, my favorite gag in the movie is probably the foul-mouthed crows. Rob Corddry, Rob Huebel, Paul Scheer, Tyler Labine, Ana Gasteyer, Thomas Lennon, Ken Jeong and John Michael Higgins co-star.