I find it hard to score this on a scale of 1 to 10. The production was well done, the cast and crew definitely did their part, and they make up the entirety of my rating. I just feel bad they worked so hard on this lemon.
The premises leads us to believe that there is a catastrophic event in this film. We get some tastes of it for a brief few moments, but ultimately, we are left wondering what real effect has happened. Soon enough, though, it becomes apparent that it is just the backdrop, and a distant one at that.
Safely tucked in a rural area, the characters go to a secluded home and join a few that were already present. They all know one another and share history, which leads to many conflicts. Oddly, this is the actual story, unresolved personal problems within their small circle. Everything else, well, it can be ignored as the characters demonstrate.
While the state of the world is apparently collapsing, these brats brush with renegades and shrug it all off. A cop car is chased by rednecks shooting an automatic rifle, and no cause for alarm. Some bikers take over the local country store, yup, once again, no problem - even though tomatoes are $40 each, and $100 for a box of tampons.
Worse, our characters without concern attempt to buy these items, including $500 worth of tampons, for about 15% of the sale price. So, with a little bartering with the heavily armed bandits, they casually go back to their world ignoring what is happening around them.
Yup, these twits are all so self-absorbed to react to the destruction and mayhem, they take the time to lollygag, smoking pot and getting drunk. On top of this, it is apparent from the start that one of the crew was responsible for the tragedy befalling the world.
The film does try to interface a threat from the outside by a pair of rogue US soldiers. They appear to present an obvious threat, but our friends barely get concerned. They calmly push these guys away and return to the partying and interpersonal drama.
Eventually, the soldiers do play a slightly more threatening role, and without many minutes wasted, it is resolved and the crew returns to kiss and make up with each other.
What really bugs me the most is how unlikable all of the characters were. I did not care about them, and actually wanted to see harm come their way for being so cavalier about the damage they caused and their general disregard for the world outside - heck, even each other!
Worse, there were too many characters, so the attention shifted from one set to another, and barely gave any screen time to the man responsible for destroying the world. I guess it was because he didn't have a significant other along with him to fight with. There truly wasn't a core set of characters, more like 10 cardboard cutouts.
Good stories focus on something remarkable. Ghost Busters used teamwork to fight a new threat from the spirit world, Blade Runner questioned definition of life when concerning androids, and Fifth Element showed us once again that love conquers all and can kick butt while doing it. Ghost Busters didn't revolve around how Annie Potts spent her time arguing with her mother. Blade Runner didn't decide that Deckard's personal life outside of work was paramount. And Fifth Element didn't mesh a savior and a hero together so that we could see them spend time together folding laundry, only to divert for a few minutes to show them save the day.
This film wasted itself by showing how some selfish entitled people can show gross disregard for everything in an uninteresting way. All the while, viewers know there must be something else happening elsewhere far more and deserving of attention, but for get about that.
The premises leads us to believe that there is a catastrophic event in this film. We get some tastes of it for a brief few moments, but ultimately, we are left wondering what real effect has happened. Soon enough, though, it becomes apparent that it is just the backdrop, and a distant one at that.
Safely tucked in a rural area, the characters go to a secluded home and join a few that were already present. They all know one another and share history, which leads to many conflicts. Oddly, this is the actual story, unresolved personal problems within their small circle. Everything else, well, it can be ignored as the characters demonstrate.
While the state of the world is apparently collapsing, these brats brush with renegades and shrug it all off. A cop car is chased by rednecks shooting an automatic rifle, and no cause for alarm. Some bikers take over the local country store, yup, once again, no problem - even though tomatoes are $40 each, and $100 for a box of tampons.
Worse, our characters without concern attempt to buy these items, including $500 worth of tampons, for about 15% of the sale price. So, with a little bartering with the heavily armed bandits, they casually go back to their world ignoring what is happening around them.
Yup, these twits are all so self-absorbed to react to the destruction and mayhem, they take the time to lollygag, smoking pot and getting drunk. On top of this, it is apparent from the start that one of the crew was responsible for the tragedy befalling the world.
The film does try to interface a threat from the outside by a pair of rogue US soldiers. They appear to present an obvious threat, but our friends barely get concerned. They calmly push these guys away and return to the partying and interpersonal drama.
Eventually, the soldiers do play a slightly more threatening role, and without many minutes wasted, it is resolved and the crew returns to kiss and make up with each other.
What really bugs me the most is how unlikable all of the characters were. I did not care about them, and actually wanted to see harm come their way for being so cavalier about the damage they caused and their general disregard for the world outside - heck, even each other!
Worse, there were too many characters, so the attention shifted from one set to another, and barely gave any screen time to the man responsible for destroying the world. I guess it was because he didn't have a significant other along with him to fight with. There truly wasn't a core set of characters, more like 10 cardboard cutouts.
Good stories focus on something remarkable. Ghost Busters used teamwork to fight a new threat from the spirit world, Blade Runner questioned definition of life when concerning androids, and Fifth Element showed us once again that love conquers all and can kick butt while doing it. Ghost Busters didn't revolve around how Annie Potts spent her time arguing with her mother. Blade Runner didn't decide that Deckard's personal life outside of work was paramount. And Fifth Element didn't mesh a savior and a hero together so that we could see them spend time together folding laundry, only to divert for a few minutes to show them save the day.
This film wasted itself by showing how some selfish entitled people can show gross disregard for everything in an uninteresting way. All the while, viewers know there must be something else happening elsewhere far more and deserving of attention, but for get about that.