Inner Office workings

Audiences said goodbye to The Office this past May and now that it's over we're starting to get a look at what might have been. Here's an interesting video that will be included in the DVD/Blu-Ray of the final season that shows some famous actors originally auditions for the roles of Michael, Jim, Pam and the rest of the Dunder Mifflin crew. Watching it, it seems as if they made the right choices to go with the people that they did, but it's still funny to think of how different the show would have been had say Seth Rogen gotten the role of Dwight.

Omen holiday

Nearly five years ago to the day, I made a post on my blog about a viral video featuring Seth Rogen and Jay Baruchel dealing with the apocalypse. Fast forward to today and that short clip has mushroomed into a full fledged movie. This is the End features Rogen and Baruchel, as well some of their other famous friends like James Franco, Jonah Hill, Craig Robinson, and Danny McBride playing exaggerated versions of themselves as they deal with the end of days.

The film begins with Franco throwing a house party for all of his famous Hollywood friends. This of course leads to several celebrity cameos having fun with their real life personalities. For instance, you'll never be able to look at Michael Cera the same way after having seen this movie. Things turn cataclysmic in a hurry, however, as massive sinkholes develop, sending most of the party guests to their death. The central cast initially survive and barricade themselves in Franco's house unsure of what's happening.

It doesn't take long before the gang goes all Lord of the Flies on each other as they squabble over food rations, sleeping arrangements, and facing their mortality. The amount of humor your derive from these scenes will vary greatly. For me, I found there to be far more misses than hits when it came to the jokes. What was interesting is that most of the scenes weren't unfunny. Rather it's that I found myself sitting there nodding in agreement with what was being said rather than laughing at the anarchy. Because these guys are playing versions of themselves, a lot of the jokes were at the expense of each other. They would mock their personality traits or their bad movies or just their general phoniness. While some will be amused by the self-deprecating nature of the humor, I found myself wondering if these guys shouldn't be taking these comments more seriously and reevaluate their career choices.

Making the film more problematic is the tone that's created surrounding the humor. There are some truly disturbing scenes, especially early on as people meet their untimely death. I realize that the apocalypse isn't exactly a day in the park, but it was hard for me to appreciate the film's humor given the unpleasant setting that it had established. A lot of the horror and craziness of the film felt more like something from Sam Raimi, which is not a genre that I'm particularly fond of.

Despite placing the film within a very specific context, This is the End too often feels disjointed. The film moves from one comedy bit to the next with no sense of progression. Ideas and jokes are introduced but very few get paid off by the end of the film. You'll have things like Emma Watson randomly show up which provides the guys with an opportunity to make a few rape jokes and then she's gone and they move onto the next riff. You begin to see that this has been a project that's been percolating for 5 (or more) years. They have this collection of various ideas that may work individually but really don't add up to anything worthwhile.

I will give credit though for giving the right cast members the appropriate personalities in the film. For instance, Jay Baruchel is intended to serve as the heart and humanity of the film, which works considering he's probably the most likeable and least "Hollywood" of the bunch. Meanwhile, Danny McBride does what he does best by playing the douchy a**hole and Jonah Hill is a disingenuous prick. I probably would have struggled with the film even more than I did had they tried to force unnatural personalities onto any of these guys.

It's interesting that this film comes right off the heels of The Internship. In many ways these films couldn't be more different. While I seem to be in disagreement with a lot of other critics on both of these films, a lot of what my reviews for both pictures come down to is mood. The Internship offered a sunny optimism that infectiously made me enjoy all of the characters in the film. I'd much rather spend two hours with that cast than I would with the dreary, unpleasant narcissism that's on display in This is the End.

After watching this movie, it's become clear that this was an idea that worked as a short viral video and should have stayed at that. As a feature length movie, this is nothing more than a poorly cobbled together collection of bits, some of which are admittedly very funny, that really don't add up to anything more than a crass vanity project for Rogen and co. I actually could do a whole separate post analyzing why the film's final joke doesn't work at all, but given that it features another surprise cameo, I won't discuss it any further here. I have been a fan of a lot of these guys' work in the past, but there have been a lot of misfires by them, Rogen in particular, recently that make me question whether or not I should continue seeing their future films. Unless some drastic changes are made, I'm afraid "this is the end" for me watching this work. Grade: C

Chain of Fools

The cast of This is the End decided to get in the holiday spirit and offer up a new "trailer" to promote their movie. Check it out below.

My only friend, the End

There seems no more fitting day than today when the purported apocalypse was supposed to happen to post this trailer for next year's comedy This is the End starring Seth Rogen, James Franco, a whole host of other funny people, and Danny McBride. This 'end of days' seems like it could be a whole lot of manic fun with a bunch of guys who are clearly real life friends and know how to riff off of each other. Warning, trailer is Not Safe For Work.

RBR: 50/50

Dealing with a subject like cancer in a film can be difficult. Trying to blend comedy and drama in a film about cancer - even harder. And yet somehow, the people behind 50/50 not only manage to pull it off, but make it look easy in the process. Joseph Gordon-Levitt turns in yet another great performance as Adam, the young man who learns he has a rare form of spinal cancer. Not only does he have to deal with his cancer, he also has to deal with people who are trying to deal with the fact that he has cancer. I really appreicated the insight the film has on interpersonal communication as it relates to this subject. The interactions Adam has with his doctor, his grief counselor (played by Anna Kendrick), his mother (Anjelica Huston), his girlfriend (Bryce Dallas Howard), and everyone else in his life feel realistic and illuminating. Sometimes people are the most insensitive when they're trying their hardest to be sensitive. I should also point out that Seth Rogen, who plays Adam's best friend, gives his best performance in years here. He provides some great laughs, yet never belittles the situation or takes you out of the moment. His character is nothing he hasn't played before, yet his personal connection to the story (the film is loosely based on Will Reiser who wrote the film and is a good friend of Rogen's) enables him to be more authentic here. If I had to quibble, it's that I felt the film was a bit short and actually could have expanded more on some of its subplots. That aside, this is a terrific little film with a superb cast that has sadly gotten overlooked this awards season. Even with the heavy subject matter, you would be doing yourself a favor and checking this one out. Rating: **** 1/2

RBR: Paul

While some will recognize Simon Pegg and Nick Frost from cult films like Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz, this film is likely the one that introduced them to a more mainstream audience thanks to the subject matter and supporting cast members along for the ride. The film is about two nerdy friends who encounter an actual alien named Paul (voiced by Seth Rogen) as they travel through the United States visiting famous alien landmarks. They're being chased by government agents, led by Jason Bateman and from there hijinx ensue. One aspect of the film's narrative is that Paul has been on Earth several years and has supposedly influenced some of pop culture's greatest alien stories (we're to believe he gave Spielberg the idea for E.T.). But this film does more than just name drop this other alien films, they often crib ideas from them as well. The end result is a mildly funny but wholly unoriginal film that does nobody any good. Fans of Pegg and Frost will likely find this to be a far inferior movie to their previous collaborations and those seeing these two for the first time will likely question why they are movie stars in the first place. I ended up seeing the 'unrated' version of this film and I found it to still be pretty tame given the work that I've seen everyone involved in this film do before. There are some fun cameos here from the likes of Bill Hader, Jane Lynch, Sigourney Weaver, Jeffrey Tambor, and even Blythe Danner, but none of the offer up much more than allowing the audience to say "Hey look, it's so-and-so". For sci-fi geeks, this has enough to make it worthy of a rental, but overall this is a disappointing effort from some talented individuals. Rating: ** 1/2